On "Catholic apologist" (???) Robert Sungenis' website, The Bellarmine Report, a page was put up on 1-16-12 under the category, "Latest News," entitled, "DVD of the Month: Stanley Kubrick Hired to Fake Apollo Moon Landings." I first saw this in a rotation ad at the top of his main website, when I visited shortly after midnight, eastern time, on 1-23-11. It's necessary to go into such detail because Bob has been known to remove controversial materials from his site, once someone critiques them. If he does, readers may trust that I saw this with my own eyes. I certainly didn't make up all this detail.

The film in question is called Kubrick's Odyssey (by Jay Weidner). Here is exactly what Bob posted on his page (from You Tube):

The lyric of the music heard in this ridiculous piece must be heard to be believed. I won't even attempt to describe how weird it is.

The film is offered at a bizarre site mentioned in the preview video, called Sacred Mysteries Marketplace, which offers all sorts of spiritually exotic materials that appear to be anything from theosophy to New Age to "alchemy." The page for the DVD here examined states:

In Kubrick's Odyssey, Part I, Kubrick and Apollo, author and filmmaker, Jay Weidner presents compelling evidence of how Stanley Kubrick directed the Apollo moon landings. He reveals that the film, 2001: A Space Odyssey was not only a retelling of Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick's novel, but also a research and development project that assisted Kubrick in the creation of the Apollo moon footage. In light of this revelation, Weidner also explores Kubrick's film, The Shining and shows that this film is, in actuality, the story of Kubrick's personal travails as he secretly worked on the Apollo footage for NASA. . . .

"Weidner produces devastating proof that the landing was shot in a studio on Earth."
--David Icke

And there are lots of secrets within Kubrick’s films, as we soon discover. Kubrick, suggests Weidner, is not only a great filmmaker, he was “privy to the main secrets of an occult society that rules the Earth.”

One of the biggest and most shocking is that Weidner speculates, through clues he found primarily in The Shining, that Kubrick faked the Apollo Moon landings, using his work on 1968’s 2001: A Space Odyssey as cover. Weidner, however, does believe the U.S. did get to the Moon, just not in the fashion we were told. . . .

Because the U.S. Government, through NASA, was hellbent to get a man on the Moon before the end of the 1960’s, as President Kennedy had promised, and because they wanted to prove to the Soviet Union that the U.S. was going to win the space race, they had to have some insurance – a way to prove, at least to the public and the world – that the U.S. had the technology and wherewithal to get to the Moon.

That’s where Kubrick comes in. Impressed with his work on Dr. Strangelove, Weidner speculates that Kubrick made a deal with the U.S. Government to fake the Apollo Moon landings – with Apollo 11 ultimately being the first one to land in July 1969.

Weidner leans towards the idea that the U.S. did go to the Moon but that the Apollo missions between 1969 and 1972 shown to the public were all staged and Kubrick was the guy directing the whole thing. . . .

. . . things get even stranger further in Weidner’s film when he uses Stephen King’s novel, The Shining, as the basis for a film with the same name. Of course this interpretation would bother purists and confuse others. But Weidner explains that Kubrick needed a way to get it out there that he was the one behind the Apollo Moon landing hoax and that The Shining would be the way he could accomplish this.

Alright. Sure! I guess Bob was getting anxious to find some new exciting conspiratorial hogwash to foist upon his readership, and this fit the bill rather spectacularly! Of course, we must visit Jay Weidner's web page: cited in the review. This is the wise sage whom Sungenis chose to promote by making his DVD the featured one of the month on his site. What can we find out about him on his page? We learn very quickly that he is a Gnostic heretic of the first order. Here is just one example of his thinking: an article from an interview of Weidner, called "Rise of the Archons." It makes for rather surreal and exotic reading:

People don’t realise that, 2,000 years ago, there was a religion on this planet called Gnosticism, which was the biggest religion on earth at the time, was vying with Hinduism. You could go take a university course on the history of religions now and wouldn’t even find a mention of Gnosticism. The Nag Hammadi texts provide a description for what the Gnostics believed. Gnostic is a Greek word meaning knowledge – gnosis. The Gnostics believe that liberation can only be achieved by knowledge, by the consumption and evaluation of reality through knowledge. The library at Alexandria was run by Gnostics and they were the first people to collect scrolls and books and assemble this information. . . . Gnostics preached that there was an invasion that occurred about 3,600 BC and, about 1,600 years before the Nag Hammadi texts were buried, they wrote that this invasion was like a virus and, in fact, they were hard pressed to describe it. The beings that were invading were called Archons. These Archons had the ability to duplicate reality, to fool us. They were jealous of us because we have an essence of some kind, a soul, that they don’t possess, and the Nag Hammadi texts describe the Archons. One looks like a reptile and the other looks like an unformed baby or a foetus. It is partially living and partially non-living and has grey skin and dark, unmoving eyes. The Archons are duplicating reality so that when we buy into it, when we come to believe that the duplicated, false state reality is the real reality - then they become the victors. . . .

I believe many of the stories of Jesus are actually Gnostic myths about a possible rebellion against the Archons who came down very severely on the rebel.. . .

I really hate to say this but we have all been fooled. The whole idea that some kind of messiah is going to come to save us is an Archon trick to make you think you don’t have to do anything about your present situation, no accountability. Maybe some supernatural force will come but I think you have to look at how this oppression occurred and why it was written out of history. When you begin to look back, you realize the early Christian, from the time of Jesus to the time of Constantine in 310 AD, they were preaching that they did not worship Jehovah; they worshiped the one true God. It could be argued that the early Christians were actually Gnostic followers of Jesus instead of what we, today, call Christians. The entire New Testament was completely rewritten by Constantine and all of the information on the Archons was removed and the ideas of Jehovah being a cruel god were lessened. This is a fact. The Nag Hammadi texts are older than the New Testament by 400 years. The New Testament that we have today wasn’t concocted until about 350 AD. When you go back to the Nag Hammadi, it doesn’t have the sin factor; they say what they really think. . . .

Rense [interviewer]: Many people look into the media – not the mainstream media – for information. So who are these Archons now? These are Talmudic Zionists, to a large degree. They are part of it, perhaps they are the central core of it. We need to start looking at the name values are and where their DNA says they came from, the Czarian Empire. They adopted Judaism and used it like a stick to beat people and hide behind at the same time which is a great tragedy for true, honest and Jews of good heart and there are millions of them. [my bolded emphasis] . . .

Weidner again: Anyone who is following this mad, insane god, Jehovah, will be lead to their death for certain.. . . The defining myth of Western mythology is that Jehovah told Adam and Eve that they could not eat of the Tree of Knowledge. Not only that but if they did eat of it, they would surely die. Yet they both ate of it and didn’t die so he wasn’t even telling them the truth.

There you have it, folks. Robert Sungenis wants to host and promote a video made by an anti-Semitic Gnostic wingnut like this? I trust that further documentation of this sort of pathetic, ludicrous, anti-Christian, conspiratorial nonsense is unnecessary. I have provided the links, if anyone else wants to discover further wonders of revelation . . .

None of this is particularly new for Bob (aside from, perhaps, the incredible recourse to an anti-Christian Gnostic as a source). I knew that he was an "agnostic" (his description) about the moon landings over a year ago, and that he believed "9-11 was an inside job and that the Muslims had nothing to do with it". Here is a portion of one of my papers about Bob's odd beliefs (his words in blue):

Bob is disturbed that I am inclined to accept what NASA tells me about science. This makes perfect sense, I reckon, since in one exchange the following skepticism regarding the authenticity of the moon landings is documented:

Jordanes had stated earlier in the combox thread that he didn't think you asserted that the moon landings were faked. Someone ("Pete") produced "documentation" that you did believe this. I find this to be insufficiently documented, as it was based on "gossipy"-type hearsay from a former associate, and from a post on a hostile website. So if you think the lunar landings actually happened, I'd be happy to hear you clarify that, so that it can be stated as a matter of record on my blog that this is an unjust charge against you.

As for my right to be an agnostic about the moon landings, I’m certainly not the first and won’t be the last. Any intelligent person who has studied the issue is going to have doubts as to whether the United States had the capability to put a man on the moon in 1969 when, for example, the processing power of a 1969 computer was less than one-tenth of that in a typical cell phone of today, especially when the U.S. was at the height of the Cold War and was still stinging from the Russian launch of Sputnik in 1957, and especially when the ability to fake a moon landing in a hidden studio was well within the talents of Hollywood technicians. My suspicions are only heightened when I see Neil Armstrong holding an American flag on the moon and suddenly a gust of wind forces the lower part of the flag to move up to the upper part of the flag. Any fool knows there is no wind on the moon. You can see this video on the Internet and in the documentaries made of the moon landings. [see one lengthy critique of this theory] Yes, and I might as well tell you so I can beat Mr. Olar to the punch: I also believe 9-11 was an inside job and that the Muslims had nothing to do with it, and I maintain this belief along with several thousand other intelligent scientists, engineers, military personnel, airline pilots, firemen and the like who, from their expertise in this area, are thoroughly convinced that we have been sold a bill of goods by our government.

I'm obviously part of this nefarious conspiracy, myself, being named Armstrong . . .

In the same paper I documented from his site, Bob's belief in "an earth of approximately 10,000 to 15,000 years old" and that "the universe rotates around the earth once per day." He denies that the earth itself rotates.

But I will modify the language a bit. It might be possible or conceivable to still regard Robert as an apologist, since he defends something about the Church or Catholic doctrine in maybe one out of every fifteen papers he does.

As long as Bob is out there purporting to represent and defend the Catholic Church, then the conspiratorial, anti-Semitic (and in this case, literally anti-Christian and Gnostic) garbage he puts out should be documented and shown for what it is.

Anyone who publishes public material in a sense of advocacy should be scrutinized if they are claiming to speak for the Church. This kind of nonsense comes back to harm apologists who actually devote themselves to defending the Church, the Bible, and Christianity, rather than spend most of their time attacking and tearing down Holy Mother Church, the Holy Father, etc.

At the top of the Bellarmine website, it says, "A Closer Look at Religion, Science, Politics and Culture."

If you look at his articles, you'll see the following there:

Wesley Clark on US/Israel

Are Evangelical Christians Warmongers? (About Evangelical support for Israel)

Chris Matthews: Israel Trying to Incite War on Iran

James Morris: Watch for Another USS Liberty Incident from Israel

Jim Stone shows Israel Behind Fukashima Disaster

Dr. Alan Sabrosky Ties Israel to

Israel Pays US Media to Slant the News

Politics, Religion, Israel and the Seduction of the Catholic Voter

Jewish Author Exposes Israel's Lies

Netanyahoo says Israel Doesn't Need U.S. Help

Should We Expect a Mass Conversion of Jews?

Israel Creating Super PAC to Defeat Ron Paul

There are a number of articles about science, too. But relatively little that would truly be characterized as "Catholic Apologetics", imo.

If you look at the newest material appearing at the Bellarmine website, you'll see that it's less and less likely to do with Catholic apologetics and more and more likely to do with conspiracy theories involving Jews and science.

Maybe it would be more accurate to call him a pop controversialist at this point?

One wonders what happened to this pledge he made:

"Because such political, cultural and social criticism of the Jews can so easily be misunderstood, I have decided to refrain from any more dealings with those aspects of Jewish life. I’ll leave criticism of Jewish politics and culture to people more capable than I apparently am. My expertise is in theology, and that is where I will put all my efforts. Hence, any future dealings that I have with the Jews, whether on our website or in published articles, will only concern the theological side of things. As you can see by the Jewish material presently on our website, every article is about theological matters, and that will always be the policy of our apostolate from here on out."

I missed the new feature story at the Bellarmine Report: "Arch-Zionist Adelson Supporting Gingrich".

Looking the website over, "Catholic Apologist" isn't what comes to my mind. Definitely something more like "pop controversialist" or "conspiracy theorist". The "Catholic" part seems very secondary to me.

This won't come close to adequately responding to your typical shot gun smear of a fellow Catholic apologist. Suffice it to say, I will be addressing, but one point here, that of 9-11.

For years now, even to this day, it has been a favorite pastime for late night-time comedians to denigrate their fellow Americans who don't go along with Big Brother's version of what happened on that fateful September day. Imagine -- they can still get a few good snickers and laughs from Boobus Americanus! Is that what you are going after when you deride Robert Sungenis for not believing our government on the question of 9-11?

Are you a student of U.S. History Dave or is that too much below or above your pay grade? If you are familiar with U.S. history Dave are you familiar with the incredible number of times our government leaders have lied to us and continue to lie to us? Did you think they somehow stopped lying to us on September 11, 2011? Did you think a self-imposed government moratorium on lying was passed that day?

Do you not know what the term false flag operation refers to Dave? Are you familiar with the documented history of false flag operations Israel has pulled off since its terrorist inception? If history books are not your bag, perhaps you could at least sit back and watch an online video: Missing Links. It will give you a good overview of the history of Israel's false flag operations before it keys in on the really big enchilada, 9-11. If you don't want to bother with that then at least take a good look at perhaps the most informative work done on 9-11 which can be found at www.bollyn.com, that is unless you are afraid of being wrongly trashed as an anti-Semite, whatever that's supposed to mean.

Of course, if you don't wish to take a good honest thorough look at 9-11, but would rather be a good government sheeple well all I can say is you won't be the first or the last to find false comfort in your ignorance of 9-11. You will also be on the right side of the hoped for audience of those late night comedian hacks as they themselves seek to remain on the right side of their paymasters and the Israeli Lobby.

Perhaps, you are saying now it's not a big deal for a Catholic apologist to take a side as to who "done it" as regards 9-11. Are you kidding?! Look around you. Do you not realize what has weighed in the balance of 9-11? Do you not realize how much bloodshed, how many mangled bodies and minds and even souls, how many widows, how many orphans, and how many totally wasted trillions of dollars could have been avoided by the mere telling of the truth by our government to her citizens.

Are you completely divorced from any sense of responsibility in not decrying the horror of the 9-11 mass murder lies which our government has perpetrated on us (and the world)? Does a Catholic apologist's responsibility end by proclaiming the truth and goodness of the Church's Just War Theory while taking an ostrich approach to whether or not it applies in a given historical context such as the most blatant one facing us with our horrific wars of intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan, neither of which we would have initiated, much less carried out if our government had not fed us a pack of preposterous 9-11 lies.

Just where do you get off anyway by deriding Robert Sunenis on telling the truth about 9-11? Are you (and your audience?) really that blind as to go along with the utter stupidities fed us by our most shameful traitorous government leaders?

I think when you start to see a pattern of this sort, then there's something more than just an honest, disinterest search for truth at work. There's a certain mind-set involved, a willingness or even desire to believe these sorts of things.

May some of these kinds of theories be true to one extent or another? Sure. But most people seem to intuitively understand that the conspiracy theorist mindset is dangerous and unhealthy. OTOH, some people are drawn to it like flies to a bug zapper. Still others even go to the extreme of trying tirelessly to draw in yet other flies to the bug zapper along with them.

Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof. Personally, I don't consider the kinds of proof offered by "Missing Links" or any other conspiracy theory video I've ever seen to be "extraordinary proof". The promotional video for "Missing Links" and the part of the movie itself that I've seen is hokey - the typical conspiracy theorist approach. A typical appeal to emotion (replete with scary music, another emotional manipulation) with factual bits thrown in to give the impression that it's an "open and shut case."

Personally, I find this video to be more conclusive proof that there was conspiracy behind the Titanic disaster:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=saHs6J0OXVI

Conspiracy theorists typically tend to fill in those "missing links" with the most nefarious information. Do they actually prove their case? No. But they still leave people with an uneasy feeling that something really bad is going on.

I'm not interested in cultivating that kind of mindset. I don't advise others to, either.

I thought the original article was about Sungenis posting an advert for a DVD about faked moon landings. Presumably James Phillips can come up with a detailed apologia as to how that too fits hand-in-glove into a robust Catholic apologetic?

And am I the only one who noticed that Phillips didn't get around to explaining how the sungenis site is now chockablock with Jewish conspiracy articles when Sungenis promised that he wasn't going to write about that anymore?

I thought the original article was about Sungenis posting an advert for a DVD about faked moon landings. Presumably Steve "scotju" Dalton can come up with a detailed apologia as to how that too fits hand-in-glove into a robust Catholic apologetic?

And am I the only one who noticed that Dalton didn't get around to explaining how the Sungenis site is now chockablock with Jewish conspiracy articles when Sungenis promised that he wasn't going to write about that anymore?

I see you have studiously avoided the one issue I raised, the issue of 9-11. Why is that?

I raised the issue of 9-11 because -- and it's not the first time either -- Mr. Armstrong appears to enjoy mocking Dr. Sungenis for his beliefs that run contrary to the standard government propaganda/lies on same. Did you not read in this article Mr. Armstrong's following words: "He [Robert Sungenis] expanded his "lunar skepticism" to 9-11." Read the full context to get the full gist of Mr. Armstrong's mockery. See how he describes the lunar skepticism he attributes to Dr. Sungenis. He calls it "pathetic, ludicrous, anti-Christian, conspiratorial nonsense."

Sure, I could have raised all kinds of other issues like the DVD itself, but of what importance is the promotion or non promotion of a DVD about the moon landings in comparison to the ongoing horrific tragedy created out of the web of lies our government has fed us regarding 9-11? Why don't you get serious about the one issue I addressed rather than trying to ignore it. Again, it was Dave who introduced the issue of 9-11 not me.

It's interesting that people like you who hide behind their anonymity are so quick on the trigger in racing off to Google up the names of those you want to throw mud at.

You publicly accuse Robert Sungenis, Michael Hoffman, and myself of anti-Semitism. Guess what Mr. or Mrs. or Miss S? You are totally wrong. Not only that, you are engaging in calumny, a rather serious sin.

I personally know these people (Yes, I even know myself!) and I can tell you that regardless of how much online calumny from others you regurgitate ad nauseum you are way off the mark.

You throw out your silly supposed denigrations of me of being a "9-11 Truther" and a Holocaust “revisionist" as if one who seeks the truth about 9-11 is automatically odd and hence not credible and that the standard 6 million gas chamber version of the Holocaust cannot be subject to any honest inquiry. (Do you take umbrage with the fact that the official death toll at Auschwitz was revised downward after 1992 from a high of 4.1 million to the current figure of 1.1 million? That's a part of official history that's been revised!)

You go on to denigrate me as being a "conspiracy theorist." The fact that you use such an inane term says a lot. The common use of the terminology of conspiracy theorist and anti-Semite are reflections of a culture bereft of a real ability to think. Instead, terms such as these are thrown around willy nilly simply to discredit the opposition without any real discussion of the underlying issues.

Hopefully, you will be able to break out of the politically correct corral, but if not you will always find happy company in Plato's cave.

"I see you have studiously avoided the one issue I raised, the issue of 9-11. Why is that?"

Because that wasn't the main topic of this article.

"See how he describes the lunar skepticism he attributes to Dr. Sungenis. He calls it "pathetic, ludicrous, anti-Christian, conspiratorial nonsense.""

Of course he was speaking specifically of the DVD that Sungenis promoted. You would appear to find it credible enough to defend. Do you buy into the lunar landing conspiracies too? You find this sort of material to be perfectly proper for a Catholic apologist to peddle? No danger of making the faith look ridiculous?

And what about that promise that Sungenis made not to write anymore about Jewish political, cultural, or social issues anymore? Pretty interesting, no?

Gee, I wonder what would happen if somebody combed through your website, and found you recommending some piece of music, or some TV show, or some film, and then proceeded to employ the hysterically illogical tactic of "guilt by association", to suggest that since you liked that piece of music, or that TV show, or that film, you therefore somehow intended to embrace everything its composer, producer, or director might happen to believe?

Might make a great blogpost, eh?

This is a new low for you, Dave.

You need to understand that what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

I doubt I am the only one who has learned that particular bit of wisdom......

You have written alot of good apologetics work on your site. In fact, I often wonder where you find the time to write so much.

That being said, one of the downsides to the current "apologetics scene" is the tendency to argue just for the sake of the argument. Curious protestants are literally attacked for asking legitimate questions at Catholic Answers and then unceremoniously banned; inconsistent theology abounds on blogs for the sake of "proving" Catholic doctrine in Scripture; or in this case, attacking another Catholic apologist.

Dr. Sungenis is, yes, an apologist. He spends a great deal of time on his current Scripture series, and the commentary on the Greek is excellent; I recommend it highly. He actually just did a debate at my request with a Church of Christ professor of mine on the authority of the Church in Alabama. He also has many children, who are fed by his apologetics efforts.

Perhaps you are offended by some of his viewpoints; I am aware of the controversies about his opinions on Judaism and Geocentrism. However, that is the beauty of the Catholic Church. You can have all the supposedly whacky ideas in the world, but as long as your dogma is aligned with the Church, you are one of the flock.

Last I checked, some of the fathers were accused of being anti-semites, and nearly all of them were geo-centrists, young-earthers, etc. However, I don't remember many, if any, of them attacking each other since they had the audacity to represent the Church in matters of official teaching. Don't we still read them and enjoy their work?

Dr. Sungenis puts food in his childrens' mouths with apologetics, and it seems that you frequently focus a great deal of effort in what appears to my eyes to be a smear; and I only know Dr. Sungenis on a superficial level. My question is, why would you do that? Does the Church need your protection from the "stain of Sungenis" as its representative? The last time I checked, none of us on earth are worthy representatives of the Body of Christ. Also, the last time I checked, in matters of Dogma Sungenis is more trustworthy than most, because he goes straight to the councils, straight to the Fathers, and straight to the Magisterium. And that, Mr. Armstrong, is all I heard when he was defending Holy Mother Church to my protestant professor: Cited Church teaching.

It seems to me that his site does not attempt to merely be an apologetics site anymore, and so attacking his apologetics or "representation" of the Church is not only a misfocused application of your talents toward another member of the Body of Christ, but contains within it a hint of malice. His apologetics is how he feeds his family.

And I'll say something else. Let's assume the worst case scenario: that Dr. Sungenis is a paranoid Jew-hating geo-centrist whackjob that thinks the world is ending in 2012 as the moon we never landed on crashes into the state of Israel while being piloted by the Illuminati wearing American flag t-shirts. Now....

Do you think turning on him and attacking him relentlessly is going to help any perceived paranoia on his end? He is a fellow brother in Christ, Dave. Maybe there should be more articles about the digusting sex abuse scandals in our Church, rather than about a man with a large family that is doing his best for us with his talents, that may have some fringe viewpoints. The Church is big enough, Dave. I promise.

In the meantime, I'd suggest ordering his pdf of the Gospel of John, it is an excellent adjunct to any study you already have; I can vouch for it.

"And what about that promise that Sungenis made not to write anymore about Jewish political, cultural, or social issues anymore? Pretty interesting, no?

>> Very interesting. In fact those following the current Michael Voris/RealCatholicTV spat in Detroit know that Bob was subjected to precisely the same demand Voris has now received.

The difference, Kurt, is that Bob did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop.

He tried to make peace.

He tried to show his bishop that his concerns were exactly with the damnable heresy from the deepest pit of hell that the USCCB had- incredibly!- allowed to appear in a Catechism.

You remember, don't you, Kurt?

"The covenant God made with the Jewish people through Moses remains eternally valid for them"?

That is heresy.

Bob called it such.

His bishop ordered him to remove material related to Jewish questions, which Bob *did*, on the understanding that Bob could continue to write about those aspects of the Jewish question which directly pertained to the theological battle concerning the Catechism.

The bishop's response was to pull the name "Catholic" from Bob's website.

The instant Bob complied with this grotesquely unjust but perfectly legal demand, Bob had the complete freedom to publish whatever he wished- just like all the rest of us here in the USA.

So the truly disturbing degree of calumniation, guilt-by-association, and character assassination exemplified both in Dave's embarrassing article, and in your insinuations, ends up redounding to your, and Dave's discredit.

I have a few thoughts for Nathan Wager if I may. You make a very emotional appeal but I really think you underestimate the damage that is done by mingling the Catholic faith with the fever swamp of political conspiracy theories. I also found it extremely odd that you could call Dave Armstrong's once in a blue moon commentary on Bob Sungenis "relentless". When I look at the contents of some of the links above and at what is on the Sungenis site right now that is more like what I call relentless. He seems absolutely obsessed with conspiracies of every shape and form and especially Jews. It got so bad that his bishop had to tell him to stop using the name Catholic.

You are in here strongly chiding Dave for his occasional comments about Sungenis. I'm curious if there is somewhere you can point us to find any public criticism by you of the behavior of Sungenis? If I have misjudged you in this then please forgive me but how strange it would be that that you are so concerned for Sungenis and so quick to criticize Dave and seem to care not a fig for the people he pounds on incessantly. Is your outrage somewhat selective?

A man has no natural right to be a Catholic apologist and certainly concerned people have no obligation to refrain from warning the faithful if a self-appointed apologist starts to say and do things that are prejudicial to the faith, especially when he has been corrected by eccleastical authority and he thumbs his nose at his bishop and starts publicly claiming he's a heretic.

You are right that we have a lot of serious problems in the Catholic Church but in my view these loose cannon apologists and "evangelists" who flip their bishops the bird when corrected are very dangerous too.

I think you are missing the point. Most normal societies become tribal and closesly bonded under adversity; not so the catty world of Catholic apologetics. We fight and clamor for the "true lay-representative of the Faith." It's ridiculous.

I underestimate the danger of mixing Catholicism with weird politics? No, I don't. Sungenis isn't the reason that the Church is dying and collection plates are empty across the West; you can thank modernism and the sex abuse scandals for that. Let's take a step back for a minute, Kurt. Most of our real adversaries and potential converts are likely to be atheists/agnostics.

Do you realize how stupid it looks to an atheist mind to see two Catholics attacking each other when they both worship a cracker and are members of an organization that shuffles around known sex offenders like playing cards? And you think Sungenis is a problem?

Since converting to Catholicism, I have noticed several disturbing trends: trad vs. neo-con vs. super duper trad vs. feminist liberals, every "mainline" apologist vs Sungenis, liberal vs the Pope, etc. People get converted by Catholic answers and then get converted right back out because the people just want to argue themselves to death. Sungenis has literally been blackballed and reduced to a fringe, when his apologetics work is easily some of the best out there in defense of the Church.

I have a crazy Uncle that hates Mexicans. He is still part of my family. We love him, we don't hide him, and we don't push him away. What would happen if we did? He would probably be in a log cabin in Idaho muttering something about illegals. In short, we would be taking a man with a potentially problematic viewpoint and further hardening him within that viewpoint with a lack of love. Instead, I have a crazy Uncle involved in my life that can tell you all about my Irish Family lineage going back well before the potato famine. Sungenis is part of a much larger family, and my contention is that there is room for him, just as there is for Dave. I realize that the apologetics scene attracts people that love to get caught up in minutia, but it seems like no argument is too small nowadays.

I've looked into the issues on both sides regarding Sungenis and Jews, his bishop, etc etc. I have come to this conclusion: It's complicated, and I don't know. I never will, either, unless I want to devote my life to digging up dirt on a fellow Catholic so I can decide whether or not I should judge him. What I can tell people, is that Sungenis is another wafer-worshipping member of my crazy family, may have some weird views, and will knock your socks off on justification.

If we are going to criticize each other, it should be an in-house thing. Apologetics websites have a wider audience, and honestly as a Church I think we have bigger fish to fry than each other.

Meanwhile, Bob advocates kooky, loony stuff that is so "out there" that even his defenders won't touch it with a ten-foot pole. I think even they know it's ridiculous, but they think Bob should have the "right" to put out garbage anyway, with no regard to its effects.

That's precisely why it needs to be addressed. People like you come around and say "his apologetics work is easily some of the best out there in defense of the Church."

I don't want this sort of goofball conspiratorial hogwash to be anybody's impression of what Catholicism is about. If I didn't fight it, I and other Catholics would be in danger of being conceptualized as advocates of this ridiculous nonsense. Anti-Catholic prejudice and misinformation is already bad enough; this just adds fuel to their fires.

Truth is truth, and that is always my goal and allegiance.

You say we ought to hide our corrections of public nonsense? Why not advocate keeping nonsense such as this, that has nothing to do with Catholicism, private instead of public in the first place? If someone favors sheer absurdity and hogwash, as this is, and does it in public, then other Catholics have to condemn it in public and show that it doesn't represent Catholicism, to believe odd, weird nutcase, kooky junk like this.

Dave, I'm not worried about Sungenis staining the bride of Christ, anymore than I am of you. The Church is bigger than you or I, and it really isn't that hard for me to answer a non-believer with the words "no, I don't agree with Sungenis on that point." And to be honest, I imagine Sungenis wouldn't have a problem with that either.

St. Paul had stinging criticism for fellow brethren that would take each other to task in court in front of the non-believers, and I see little to no difference in your approach. It is not your task in life to safeguard the perceived augustness of our Faith from descending into ridiculousness. God confounds the wise, we worship God in the appearance of unleavened bread, and Sungenis is still part of our "here comes everyone" Catholic Faith.

In other words, as soon as Bob has a public website and puts out questionable information under the guise of "Catholic apologetics," he is fair game for public criticism, just like anyone else.

The problem is, Bob (to put it as mildly as possible) doesn't take kindly to criticism of any sort. He has, for years, reacted in a highly defensive manner to any and all attempts to criticize him. It's always a three-ring circus when anyone dares to disagree with Baghdad Bob.

Shortly I will be posting yet another article in a long series, from my friend David Palm, documenting numerous examples of this behavior.

I for one am sick and tired of it. If even this present sheer nonsense can't be condemned by his rabid followers, then there is nothing rational people can do. Some folks are beyond all hope in terms of being persuaded by reason and fact and even common sense. We must leave them to prayer and miracles of grace.

But those outside looking in (or those on the fence) can see that there are Catholics who will call foolishness for what it is, and won't put up with kooky conspiratorial theories set forth by anti-Christian Gnostic loons, adopted and promoted in "DVDs of the Month." There is simply no choice.

I ignore 95% of what Bob puts out. But I saw this in visiting his site (the first time in many months) and it was just too much to not criticize. He refuses to cease and desist with this kind of hogwash, even though he has stated that he would (as noted by others in this combox). He keeps doing it, and so occasionally we respond to it.

And don't let Bob pretend that he doesn't severely criticize others in the apologetics world. He has savaged Karl Keating, Scott Hahn, Mark Shea, Jimmy Akin, myself, and others (not even to mention Blessed Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI. And it is far worse than anything I have ever done. Basically I simply document the nonsense for all to see, as it is its own refutation.

If Bob wants to put out kooky stuff: anti-Semitism, 9-11 denial, an earth that doesn't rotate, fake moon landings, the entire universe going around the earth every day, or asserting that an omniscient God can change His mind, he has that right. It's when he does so under the guise of legitimate Catholic apologetics that there is a huge problem.

St. Paul had stinging criticism for fellow brethren that would take each other to task in court in front of the non-believers, and I see little to no difference in your approach.

This has nothing to do with courts. You have it exactly backwards. St. Paul was scathingly critical of the Galatians and the Corinthians (FAR more than anything I've said): all the while acknowledging them as brethren and Christians and as churches.

Jesus did the exact same with the seven churches in Revelation. And he lambasted the Pharisees, right after telling His followers to do what they teach, but not imitate what they do (Matthew 23). All of that made it into the Bible: to be read by millions henceforth.

Lastly, St. Paul rebuked St. Peter (whom we believe was the leader of the early Church and first pope) in front of everyyone, for playing the hypocrite. That, too, made it into the Bible for posterity, and Protestants throw it in our face, by misinterpreting it.

Nathan, I think Dave had some good responses to you and perhaps not surprising to you I'm going to strongly disagree with you as well. I think that in all of the issues you raise the real scandal comes precisely when good Catholics DON'T stand up to the evil in the Church (sorry for shouting). To just stand by and say nothing in the face of injustice is wrong. And again I come back to my question why you felt compelled to rebuke Dave publicly but as far as I can see you have never once corrected Sungenis in any way. Why this strange disconnect? You really think it is worse that Dave would say that something is wrong with Sungenis writings than that there IS something wrong with them (sorry again for shouting).

And to Rick Delano, I didn't see your attempted defense of Sungenis until after I had last posted. Basically I believe that bishops (and popes!) get the benefit of many doubts and from what I have read Sungenis has not even come close to proving anything he has charged against the bishop.

And I'll say to you what I've said to each of the Sungenis supporters in turn. I thought the original article was about Sungenis posting an advert for a DVD about faked moon landings. Presumably Rick Delano can come up with a detailed apologia as to how that too fits hand-in-glove into a robust Catholic apologetic?

And am I the only one who noticed that Delano didn't get around to explaining how the Sungenis site is now chockablock with Jewish conspiracy articles when Sungenis promised that he wasn't going to write about that anymore?

DELANO: Gee, I wonder what would happen if somebody combed through your website, and found you recommending some piece of music, or some TV show, or some film, and then proceeded to employ the hysterically illogical tactic of "guilt by association", to suggest that since you liked that piece of music, or that TV show, or that film, you therefore somehow intended to embrace everything its composer, producer, or director might happen to believe? (END)

And what did Robert Sungenis himself have to say about that (to none other than Dave Armstrong!)?

Robert Sungenis: “If you have no political affiliation with these neo-cons, then I suggest you put a disclaimer on your site, otherwise people are going to get the wrong impression, and you can't blame them if they do. Any person with common sense who sees their names on your web site would assume that you support the political views of the aforementioned unless you say otherwise.” (END)

Hoffman uses the term "Judaic" because, according to him, today's Jews are imposters. They're not Jews at all.

http://www.antisemitism.org.il/eng/Michael%20A.%20Hoffman%20II

Hoffman wrote : "you refer to a modern people you term 'Jews.' You call these people Jews rather than Judaics. If you can defend your use of the term that's fine, but since the records of the Temple with the genealogical data were destroyed in AD 70 and we don't believe anything else the rabbis say, why do we believe them when they assert that they are descendants of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and King David?...Many are indeed followers of Judaism and so the term Judaic seems accurate as a description."

Sungenis says Jews are "godless", that they're trying to take over the Catholic Church, that they've "infected our Catholic Church", that the Holocaust was that period of time when "the Jews turned on the Germans because they got a better deal from someone else". And he tried to make it appear as though Pope Benedict XVI is sympathetic to Holocaust "revisionism", which completely false. Obviously, there's much more where that came from.

So I'm very comfortable with others looking at what I wrote above and comparing it to what you and Sungenis have written and promoted about Jews, scientists, the Church, et al and deciding which of us is more reasonable and charitable.

James writes, "You publicly accuse Robert Sungenis, Michael Hoffman, and myself of anti-Semitism. Guess what Mr. or Mrs. or Miss S? You are totally wrong. Not only that, you are engaging in calumny, a rather serious sin."

Calumny requires that the statement be false. I'm comfortable allowing others to judge whether the kinds of things I mentioned from Sungenis and Hoffman above constitute anti-Semitism according to the common definition: prejudice or hostility against Jews as a group.

James writes, "Do you take umbrage with the fact that the official death toll at Auschwitz was revised downward after 1992 from a high of 4.1 million to the current figure of 1.1 million? That's a part of official history that's been revised!"

This was never the "official" death toll at Auschwitz, as though scholars widely agreed upon it. There's a story behind this number that you should read. And this particular "revision" has no bearing on the approximate figure of 6 million Jews being killed in the Holocaust. This issue is a canard often trotted out by Holocaust deniers.

http://www.nizkor.org/ftp.cgi/camps/auschwitz/4-million-variant

http://www.nizkor.org/faqs/auschwitz/auschwitz-faq-09.html

The kind of Holocaust "revisionism" you, Sungenis and Hoffman champion is of a completely different nature. You would like people to believe that total was perhaps in the thousands. No serious historian believes that. But it is widely championed by conspiracy theorists.

Is anyone willing to defend this lunatic Weidner, whose DVD Bob promotes, or is the idea (like much of politics) to ignore the actual substance of the post as much as possible and simply attack me?

I know these are standard Sungenis lapdog tactics: seen time and again on this blog, but the rather obvious point needed to be made.

This present post of mine is the first time Weidner's name has even been mentioned in this entire combox: let alone his wacko ideas and Sungenis' advocacy of his video defended.

I understand the embarrassment, but at some point a man has to stand up and be a man and cease being a wimp and an intellectual coward: to relentlessly ignore the very issue at hand; and have the courage of his convictions, and manfully defend them or else retract them.

We're supposed to just put our heads in the sand and throw Frisbees and sing Kumbaya when someone who purports to defend Catholicism (who still influences many thousands) touts a video by a wacko wingnut Gnostic anti-Christian? This is what causes people to mock Holy Mother Church and our Holy faith.

And then he writes an ultra-silly failed reductio, complete with two quotations falsely attributed to me, and ruminations about how I lay awake at night dreaming of Led Zeppelin reunion concerts and how I probably dropped acid in the old days (when in fact I am squeaky clean with regard to any drugs), I'm supposed to sit here like a statue and do nothing, either?

If I didn't point out this sort of outrageous, outlandish, ludicrous nonsense, I wouldn't be an apologist at all. This is what we do: refute errors. Bob is harming Holy Mother Church and the apologetics enterprise with this nonsense, and I am defending both.

You say that Bob is entitled to have his opinion. Yes, of course. Free country; free speech.

And I am equally entitled (and duty-bound) to note if publicly posted opinions by one who claims to be almost uniquely qualified to defend Catholicism are ludicrous and ridiculous (for reasons I present for the perusal of readers).

You make out that it is no big deal (just more kooky, tin foil hat stuff from Bob; what else is new?). But I can turn the tables on that and say it is no deal for me to reply to Bob's ad. He can write it; I can respond. It's all public and fair game.

Why, then, is it Chicken Little when anyone dares to critique Grand Poobah Bob? Why is it instant hysteria and instant attack against anyone who dares do so? Is Bob's "apologetic" vision so majestic and sublime and exalted that no mere mortal can ever deign to make the slightest criticism of it?

Even popes do not have that level of immunity from any criticism. But for some reason Bob does, in the eyes of his lackeys, and seemingly, in Bob's own opinion.

It's just a few folks critiquing something he did; no big deal at all . . .

But if you are as embarrassed by this as you should be, the drama queen histrionics and grandiose and pompous and condescending denunciations on behalf of your Big Hero make perfect sense.

1) I do not know who Weidner is except for what you tell me. He might be a Gnostic or Anti-Christian for all I know, but that does not automatically stamp him as a liar about Kubrick.

2) It is Gnostic and Antichristian to say a Demiurge created amaterial universe that is made one way and then arranged it so we could be fooled in believing it was another way. It is not gnostic or antichristian, though it might be factually wrong, to say Apollo landing was staged by Kubrick.

3) Even if it was not, that is not a case against each and every school of Geocentrism, see further my post:

I furthermore argue - down in comments - that the cases against such a fake - big scenario, small scenario, et c. - by one Astronomer are not quite as strong as those a Christian could make againt any kind of "disciples stole the body" kind of conspiracy.

4) Robert Sungenis is clearly antizionist, and he should be. Care to read Zionist founder Theodor Herzl's account of meeting Pope Saint Pius X? That account clearly states the Pope's, the Saint's, and by extension the Catholic's view about Zionism.

Oh, of course Sungenis and I do not condone in any way an article like "Rise of the Archons" - see further my posting and commenting the clearly antiaverroist and antignostic condemnations by Stephen Tempier, Bishop of Paris - and trying to imply either of us does is indulging in "guilt by association".

The point I was making above is simple: this is just one more example of how Bob has one standard for himself and a completely different one for everyone else. Unfortunately, Sungenis fans like you don't even notice or question it. It's goofy and weird. And I agree with Dave about the source in this case. Bob just doesn't think. If he thinks something helps his case against Jews, he just can't resist posting it. It doesn't matter if it's an anti-Catholic like Texe Marrs (http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2008/09/proverbs-2611.html), the white supremacists at National Vanguard (http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2007/04/sungenis-source-shut-down-by.html AND http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2007/05/sungenis-dishonesty-and-hypocrisy-over.html) or some unknown kid from somewhere who sends him a bogus quote of a Catholic who is Jewish (http://www.pugiofidei.com/fraud.htm). Maybe the weirdest case is Ted Pike who Bob has even admitted in the past to be a bad source and he assured everyone that he would never (NEVER!) knowingly use him...only to then use him over and over again ( http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2009/02/more-sungenis-anti-jewish-duplicity-on.html ). The same stupid practice is apparently at work in regard to his "science". Maybe Bob needs to hire a full-time "fact checker and source exonerator" (Ben Douglass used to take care of that for him as a volunteer, but he had to resign from exhaustion....moral outrage.)

But, all lunar-landing conspiracy theory goofiness aside, what actually brought me here is more serious. You (and also Bob) continue to spread slander about a Catholic bishop here and elsewhere. That gets my attention much more than Bob's wing-nut conspiracy theories about science. I've seen you (Rick) do this elsewhere recently, such as Fr. Zuhlsdor's blog where you forced the subject of Bob Sungenis and his lies about Bishop Rhoades into a thread that wasn't even about Bob.

These accusations are "slanderous and erroneous", to use the Bishop's own words. The proof has been out there for a long time and you've all been pointed to it numerous times. Your comment that "Bob did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop" actually made me laugh out loud. If I'd been drinking milk, I would have snorted it out my nose. You can't really be serious. In case you are, I'll be giving you the proof again in the near future here. Could you finally take the time to look it over more carefully so that you can stop spreading these lies about Bishop Rhoades, Rick? I know you really look up to Bob and that you're on his board of directors, but come on. Enough is enough.

I censor anti-Semitic bigots, Diego, not "the infallible word of God." Last time I checked, the whole human race is fallen and in rebellion against God, and hence worthy of judgment, not just the Jews.

We are far more culpable today, in most of the world, based on abortion alone, for our outrageous sins, than the Jews ever were, because we have more revelation.

If I understand you correctly, it seems that you assert that I have posted lies about Bishop Rhoades.

Certainly, if this can be demonstrated, I will be the very first both to acknowledge the fact, and publicly apologize on my blog.

Now in order to allow me to obey the Faith, which requires me to proceed from an informed and examined conscience when assessing such accusations, I would like to propose that you point out to me exactly what I said that you considered to be a lie.

The exact words, if you would.

If you could, try and restrain the editorial commentary to the extent you can, since that editorial comment would reflect your interpretation of my words, and I would like to examine the words themselves, first.

In this way we might possibly be able to come to a better understanding.

The registered letter from the Diocese of Harrisburg to Bob on 29 June 2007 was the response to years' worth of material that Bob had posted about Jews, Judaism, and Jewish converts, gleaned and often plagiarized from Nazis, neo-Nazis, holocaust revisionists, conspiracy theorists, and white supremacists. (This is all documented at http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com).

More details on the sequence of events I report below may be found at http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2008/02/timeline-of-events.html

On 29 June of that year the Bishop of Harrisburg told Bob to “immediately desist from commenting on the Jewish people and Judaism both online and in all other publications” (Thomas J. Herron, “Fear of the Jews in Harrisburg,” Culture Wars, Oct 2007, p. 9). The bishop gave Sungenis, "a two week notice in this letter to pull down all comments concerning Jews, Judaism, Israel and Zionism from his web site" (ibid.)

On 3 July, just four days after he had received the cease and desist order from his bishop, Sungenis posted his article “Jacob Michael, the Imprimatur and the Smear Campaign”. The document is dated 1 July 2007 and was posted to the CAI website two days later on 3 July. In it, Sungenis smears Bishop Rhoades:

"With all due respect to Bishop Rhoades, I believe I know what his theological viewpoint is, since he is a protégé of William Cardinal Keeler and very close to him personally and theologically, Keeler having come from the Harrisburg diocese and the ordinary who ordained Rhoades. If you remember, Cardinal Keeler was a co-author with several Jewish rabbis of the Reflections on Covenant and Missions document in 2003. I think you get the picture. I won't say anymore out of respect for Bishop Rhoades" (Jacob Michael, the Imprimatur and the Smear Campaign, p. 11).

At that time, we wrote on the RSATJ blog:

"Sungenis opted to smear his own bishop with innuendo and guilt by association and then had the nerve to claim he was showing “respect” for him by so doing. The reader will notice that Sungenis provided no substantive documentation for his implied charges. He simply associated Bishop Rhoades with Jews, Cardinal Keeler and the RCM document and that was enough for him to conclude that the Bishop must subscribe to the dual salvific covenant position, . . . This attack on Bishop Rhoades is particularly outrageous and hypocritical as Sungenis and his associates have bitterly complained that Sungenis is a victim of guilt by association in regard to Jewish issues. They have argued that he is being called an anti-Semite simply because some of his sources are anti-Semitic. However, in Sungenis’ case, it is most certainly not a matter of guilt by association. It is not guilt by association when one actively and purposely promotes, uses and otherwise directly associates oneself with the “Jewish research” of anti-Semites. In stark contrast, Sungenis provided no documentation at all that bishop Rhoades holds to or promotes the “two separate, salvific covenants” concept suggested by the RCM document. His mistreatment of Bishop Rhoades is therefore a classic example of guilt by association. . . " (http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2007/07/sungenis-smears-bishop-continues-to.html)

By 13 July 2007, a full two weeks after Bishop Rhoades had given Sungenis "a two week notice in this letter to pull down all comments concerning Jews, Judaism, Israel and Zionism from his web site", the CAI website still featured numerous Jewish-related articles (these are documented here: http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2008/02/timeline-of-events.html). A Web archive snap-shot of Bob's site dated 17 July 2007 (almost three weeks after the letter) shows these pieces still on the site: http://web.archive.org/web/20070717090906/http://catholicintl.com/

There are several statements you’ve made that are typical rash speculation – such as your suggestion that Bishop Rhoades is behind the situation with Michael Voris. And the chronologies you've laid out are so distorted and selective as to be falsehoods. One example is your claim at Fr. Z’s blog that Bob's "reward" from Bishop Rhoades for objecting to one sentence on page 131 of the USCCA was to be forced by His Excellency to remove the word "Catholic" from his website. That’s not why he was directed to remove the name “Catholic”, Rick. Bishop Rhoades even personally voted to change that sentence in the USCCA - which we also reported years ago. His Excellency’s rejection of the dual covenant error is also made clear here:

Please read it slowly and carefully, even clicking on the links in the article and reviewing the information there.

If you want to get a better picture of why Bob was directed to stop writing about Jews and ultimately to remove the name “Catholic” from his website, then read this the piece linked directly below. Pay particular attention to the last section, "A More Reasonable Narrative". Again, please read it slowly and carefully, even clicking on the links in the article and reviewing the information there.

You claim that Bob "tried to make peace" with Bishop Rhoades. I suppose that could be true, if you mean peace in the way that Islam means peace (see: http://www.answering-islam.org/Hoaxes/salamislam.html). LOL But your statement that "Bob did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop" can only be characterized as a lie. Whether you know that it's a lie, I don't know. You should know, however, because the information and proof has been out for a long time and it’s been presented on multiple occasions.

After you read the pieces linked above, then please read the following chronology:

“Phase I” of Bob trying “to make peace” and doing “everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop”:

A registered letter was sent from the Diocese of Harrisburg to Bob on 29 June 2007 in response to years' worth of material that Bob had posted about Jews, Judaism, Jewish converts, gleaned and often plagiarized from Nazi, neo-Nazi, holocaust revisionists, conspiracy theorists, and white supremacists.

On 29 June of that year the Bishop of Harrisburg told Bob to “immediately desist from commenting on the Jewish people and Judaism both online and in all other publications” (Thomas J. Herron, “Fear of the Jews in Harrisburg,” Culture Wars, Oct 2007, p. 9). The bishop gave Sungenis, "a two week notice in this letter to pull down all comments concerning Jews, Judaism, Israel and Zionism from his web site" (ibid.)

On 3 July, just four days after he had received the cease and desist order from his bishop, Sungenis posted his article “Jacob Michael, the Imprimatur and the Smear Campaign”. The document is actually dated 1 July 2007 and was posted to the CAI website two days later on 3 July. In it, Sungenis smears Bishop Rhoades thusly:

"With all due respect to Bishop Rhoades, I believe I know what his theological viewpoint is, since he is a protégé of William Cardinal Keeler and very close to him personally and theologically, Keeler having come from the Harrisburg diocese and the ordinary who ordained Rhoades. If you remember, Cardinal Keeler was a co-author with several Jewish rabbis of the Reflections on Covenant and Missions document in 2003. I think you get the picture. I won't say anymore out of respect for Bishop Rhoades" (Jacob Michael, the Imprimatur and the Smear Campaign, p. 11).

At that time, we wrote on the RSATJ blog:

"Sungenis opted to smear his own bishop with innuendo and guilt by association and then had the nerve to claim he was showing ‘respect’ for him by so doing. The reader will notice that Sungenis provided no substantive documentation for his implied charges. He simply associated Bishop Rhoades with Jews, Cardinal Keeler and the RCM document and that was enough for him to conclude that the Bishop must subscribe to the dual salvific covenant position, . . . This attack on Bishop Rhoades is particularly outrageous and hypocritical as Sungenis and his associates have bitterly complained that Sungenis is a victim of guilt by association in regard to Jewish issues. They have argued that he is being called an anti-Semite simply because some of his sources are anti-Semitic. However, in Sungenis’ case, it is most certainly not a matter of guilt by association. It is not guilt by association when one actively and purposely promotes, uses and otherwise directly associates oneself with the “Jewish research” of anti-Semites. In stark contrast, Sungenis provided no documentation at all that bishop Rhoades holds to or promotes the “two separate, salvific covenants” concept suggested by the RCM document. His mistreatment of Bishop Rhoades is therefore a classic example of guilt by association. . . " (http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2007/07/sungenis-smears-bishop-continues-to.html)

But Bob gave his best to make peace. He did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop.

By 13 July 2007, a full two weeks after Bishop Rhoades gave Bob "a two week notice in this letter to pull down all comments concerning Jews, Judaism, Israel and Zionism from his web site", the CAI website still featured numerous Jewish-related articles (these are documented here: http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2008/02/timeline-of-events.html). A Web archive snap-shot of Bob's site dated 17 July 2007 (three weeks after the letter) shows these pieces still on the site: http://web.archive.org/web/20070717090906/http://catholicintl.com/

In fact, throughout July, in spite of his bishop’s order to “desist from commenting on the Jewish people and Judaism”, Bob even posted several new pieces on Jews/Israel. He posted a cartoon of a Jewish soldier with a machine-gun pointed at the head of a young Palestinian child. He posted a Q and A in which he went to great lengths to downplay the relationship of the Jewish people to God. He wrote “,Jacob Michael, As A.ss in Sheep’s Clothing”. And he also posted a review of a book by James Petras in which he made his own personal prophecy of “judgment” and “punishment” for Israel and damned the Jewish people by saying, "The Jews are godless and getting more ungodly with each passing day." Additionally, CAI associate Chris Campbell even takes Sungenis’s principle articles on Jewish issues and re-posts them to a separate blog so that the articles that are supposed to be removed are now at two independent locations.

But Bob gave his best to make peace. He did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop.

“Phase 2” of Bob trying “to make peace” and doing “everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop”:

Bob ultimately kept these articles about Jews up for a full month after he received the Bishop Rhoades’ letter telling him that he had only two weeks to cease and desist. Then, after this flagrant, in-your-face disobedience and defiance, on 27 July 2007 Sungenis was called in to meet with Fr. King, the vicar general of the Diocese of Harrisburg and Fr. Massa, a representative of the USCCB. In that meeting, Sungenis was presented with the worst of the material he had posted concerning the Jews. It was only after this summons to the diocese that Bob finally budged and indicated his intention to comply with the diocesan directive.

But Bob gave his best to make peace. He did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop.

Just a few days after the meeting, Bob wrote an article in which he admitted that the diocese had problems with his tone and his content, his inappropriate language and his accusations. This is important because, as documented below, he later spun the exchange as if they only had problems with his tone. Note too that Bob told them at that time that he agreed with their assessment of his writings (which, presumably, would cover problems with content and accusations, as well tone and language):

"[The] vicar general [of the diocese], the Very Reverend William J. King, JCD, along with the executive director for ecumenical and inter-religious affairs of the USCCB, the Reverend James Massa, the shepherds God has placed as overseers of my life and work have asked me to reconsider the tone and content with which I write about the Jewish people for CAI. They provided me various examples in which I have crossed the line into inappropriate language and accusations, and I communicated to them my agreement with their overall assessment."

Bob continued on to speak in glowing tones about the priests with whom he had met and lauded his own obedience in lofty terms:

"Since I am a faithful son of the Catholic Church, I take their wisdom and counsel with the utmost seriousness and consider their direction as if it was from God himself. I consider it an honor not only to be a member of the Catholic Church but also to be under the vigilance of such wise and caring pastors."

He went on to state that his removal of material from the CAI website was instigated based on “my bishop’s directive”. This is important since, later, Bob portrayed this move as purely voluntary on his part. He also promised that whatever he put up on the site from then on would conform to his bishop’s sensibilities:

"Accordingly, CAI is in the process of removing all the content on its website concerning the Jews in order to make the initial adjustments in complying with my bishop’s directive. . . . If in the future we write any new material on the Jews, it will always be with the required due diligence, as if the bishop were present with us. Since he acts in God’s stead, we will do our utmost to please him so as to preserve the peace and tranquility he so desires to maintain in the body of Christ”."

“With the deepest appreciation to my bishop, the Very Reverend Kevin Rhoades, his vicar general, the Very Reverend William King, the Reverend James Massa and the USCCB. . .”

The important points to keep in mind as this unfolds is that 1) Sungenis stated that the diocese had problems with both his tone and his content/accusations, 2) he agreed with their overall assessment, 3) he spoke of his bishop's "directive", and 4) he heaped lavish praise on Frs. King and Massa and Bishop Rhoades.

Palm: There are several statements you’ve made that are typical rash speculation – such as your suggestion that Bishop Rhoades is behind the situation with Michael Voris.

>> I notice first, Mr. Palm, that you did not provide what I asked for; that is, you did not provide my words. There is an excellent reason for this.

No such words exist.

DP: And the chronologies you've laid out are so distorted and selective as to be falsehoods.

>> So you say. But again, since you do not apply your claim above to any actual words of mine, it is clear that you are unable to demonstrate this.

DP: One example is your claim at Fr. Z’s blog that Bob's "reward" from Bishop Rhoades for objecting to one sentence on page 131 of the USCCA was to be forced by His Excellency to remove the word "Catholic" from his website. That’s not why he was directed to remove the name “Catholic”, Rick.

>> Nothing to do with it? Bunk. Please do not insult our intelligence, Mr. Palm.

DP: Bishop Rhoades even personally voted to change that sentence in the USCCA - which we also reported years ago.

>> I am afraid your timeline is a little out of whack here, Mr. Palm. First off, the USCCA was published with an heresy:

"Therefore the covenant God made with the Jews through Moses remains eternally valid for them."

A moment's reflection upon the enormity of that heresy is in order.

It is a direct contradiction of Scripture, of the dogmatic teaching of the Church, and of the very essence of Christ's Redeeming Sacrifice on the Cross.

Bob Sungenis, fully aware of the theological implications of an official promulgation of such an outrage, did not and could not have stood by silently.

Bishop Rhoades, on the other hand, publicly suggested that in his view the sentence could be interpreted in an orthodox way.

Since Bob could not in conscience allow such equivocations to carry the day on a matter which, after all, speaks directly to the heart of the Faith itself, he published the famous essay in "Culture Wars" which so demolished this grotesque teaching that it was, in an action unprecedented in the history of the USCCB, *removed from future editions*.

It is very much to Bishop Rhoades' credit that he voted to excise this disastrous falsehood from the USCCA.

It is very much to Bob's credit that he wrote the essay in "Culture Wars" which situated the theological stakes in such a powerful and utterly devastating way, that even the bureaucracy at the USCCB had to yield to the rejection of their botch job, and acquiesce in its removal by the direct and overwhelming vote of our bishops!

Bob would, in a better time, have been rewarded by his bishop for his courage and faithfulness in this matter.

Instead, he was given the same treatment, by Bishop Rhoades and his Vicar General, which we now see being meted out to Michael Voris at RealCatholicTV.

The difference- at this stage- is that Bob Sungenis complied with the grotesquely unjust but perfectly legal demand of his ordinary that he remove the word "Catholic" from his website.

So far you have demonstrated nothing except a relapse into your years-long, fanatical campaign against Bob Sungenis, and, it seems, also against any Catholic who admires the work he does, and has done, in defense of our Holy Faith.

Now that I fully understand your intentions in this matter, I intend to write a full treatment of the entire affair, with timeline and documentation, on my blog.

Given the current situation with Voris and RCTV, I think folks will find it interesting.

Thank you very much Mr. DeLano for this very forthright reply. I think it helps many of us put into a more clear perspective what has been going on as regards the relentless persecution including much calumny against Dr. Robert Sungenis. I look forward to your further discussion of this matter on your blogsite.

Hey Rick, this is actually really, really fascinating. We get to see a conspiracy theory developed before our very eyes, complete with a fabricated history, glaring anachronisms, and special gnostic insight known only to the theorists. It's pretty clear that you didn't bother to read what we've written in the links posted above, but in any case let's look at what you have written here.

You raised a lot of issues and I hope to hit the highlights, at least. This combox format is really difficult, so in addition to posting it here I’ve also posted it in its entirety here: https://sites.google.com/site/sungenisandthejews/rick-delano-creates-a-conspiracy

Now, let’s get started. You wrote, “I would like to propose that you point out to me exactly what I said that you considered to be a lie. The exact words, if you would.”

I cited your exact words and repeated them several times. You claimed that Bob "tried to make peace" and that "Bob did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop". I responded in detail—and there is still much more evidence to post—as to why I consider that a lie. You did not respond to any of it. Maybe you just missed it.

I documented that after almost five years’ worth of propaganda that Bob had posted about Jews, Judaism, Jewish converts, gleaned and sometimes plagiarized from Nazis, neo-Nazis, holocaust revisionists, conspiracy theorists, and white supremacists, he received a notice to take down the Jewish material on his site within two weeks. A month later he had not only not taken down any material, he had openly slandered his bishop and added more inflammatory material against Jews, until he had to be called in to the diocese. I think most people would consider that to be in-your-face disobedience. Is it your position that this is how Bob “tried to make peace” and how Bob “did everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop"? How do you think this sort of behavior disposed the diocese to view him?

Before going on to address those verbatim quotes from you that were false, Rick, I wrote:

“There are several statements you’ve made that are typical rash speculation – such as your suggestion that Bishop Rhoades is behind the situation with Michael Voris.” http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2012/01/2012-sungenis-odd-yssey-robert-sungenis.html?showComment=1327665838084#c6213529104254996472

To which, you (Rick) replied:

“I notice first, Mr. Palm, that you did not provide what I asked for; that is, you did not provide my words. There is an excellent reason for this. No such words exist.”

Again, I did in fact provide exact quotes from you and what you said was plainly false. But before showing those examples, I wanted people to know that you did more than that. You also offered some rash speculations and played the innuendo game in a way that could only titillate rather than edify.

So, let’s took a look at what you actually wrote, word for word, at Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s blog (http://wdtprs.com/blog/2011/12/more-on-the-archd-detroit-v-real-catholc-tv-dust-up/)

Comment 1 by Rick DeLano:

In any event, this action is not the first time we have seen this canon applied [the situation with Michael Voris]. Bob Sungenis was ordered to remove the word “Catholic” from his website several years ago by....

Yup.

Bishop Kevin Rhoades.

The plot, most definitely thickens....

Comment 2 by Rick DeLano:

Bob, again, complied. In the meantime, Bishop Rhodes [sic] was transferred to South Bend, where…..

Yes, I can see that you absolutely had no intention at all of leading people to think that Bishop Rhoades was behind events with Michael Voris in some way [wink-wink, nudge-nudge]. Do you really want to swear on your honor as a Catholic that this wasn’t at all your intention?

Seriously, though, have you ever written for a tabloid, Rick? Your writing often comes off that way. You have a real flair for the dramatic (a skill you no doubt picked up working there in Hollywood). You really know how to string it out and draw people in for the kicker... "...Yup. (long pause) Bishop Rhoades. (long pause) The plot most definitely thickens....” It’s a shame that you couldn’t download some spooky music to further enhance the conspiratorial tension you managed to build up there. You've obviously got that schtick down pat, using almost exactly the same technique in two separate comments, trying to gin up some attention. Nicely done! LOL.

And, of course, there's no import to the fact that you forced this subject into an article that had nothing to do with Bob Sungenis, either. Right? Right.

Here’s another place where you muddle up the facts, Rick. At Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s blog, you wrote:

“The chancery office [Diocese of Harrisburg] then proceeded to demand that Bob cease writing on Jewish issues entirely – even after Bob had complied with the Bishop’s demand! Bob sought canonical advice, and declined the chancery office’s pre-emptive censoring of his right to comment upon issues pertaining to – exactly – the then festering ‘dual covenant’ heresy” (http://wdtprs.com/blog/2011/12/more-on-the-archd-detroit-v-real-catholc-tv-dust-up)

The problem?

The Diocese of Harrisburg wrote to Bob about removing the name "Catholic" if he would not stop writing about all Jewish issues on 23 August 2007.

Almost a year after, Fr. Brian Harrison wrote the following in an article posted at Bob’s website that was authored specifically to cover the canonical aspect of Bob's situation:

“With hindsight, we can say that it was a pity Robert did not think to seek expert canonical advice before writing his January 2008 Culture Wars article” (June 2008; http://web.archive.org/web/20081205022610/http://www.catholicintl.com/articles/Harrisburg%20letter%20about%20Rhoades.pdf)

So you and Fr. Harrison flatly contradict each other. And of course, you also gave the false impression that the mean old Diocese of Harrisburg was just completely unfair and capricious with humble, heroic and obedient Bob for no good reason. Poor Bob was just the picture of Catholic obedience and did nothing wrong! Riiiight.

Rick, you claimed above that “I am afraid your timeline is a little out of whack here, Mr. Palm.” You then went on to mention a specific communication from Bishop Rhoades. Although you did not cite a date, this communication took place on 7 Feb 2008 (http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2008/02/bishop-rhoades-sets-record-straight_21.html). You then claimed that, “Since Bob could not in conscience allow such equivocations to carry the day on a matter which, after all, speaks directly to the heart of the Faith itself, he published the famous essay in ‘Culture Wars’”.

Rick, the article in Culture Wars was published in the January 2008 issue, before the communication from Bishop Rhoades. So I'm afraid your timeline is the one that's a little out of whack here.

You then state that, “Bob would, in a better time, have been rewarded by his bishop for his courage and faithfulness in this matter. Instead, he was given the same treatment, by Bishop Rhoades and his Vicar General, which we now see being meted out to Michael Voris at RealCatholicTV.”

The action to be rewarded, presumably, would be the publishing of the article in Culture Wars you mention in the immediately preceding paragraph. That “same treatment”, presumably, would be the order to remove the word “Catholic” from the organization, right? Rick, the two communications from the Diocese of Harrisburg that spoke of removing “Catholic” from Bob’s organization were on 29 June 2007 and 23 August 2007. The article in Culture Wars was published in January of 2008. So I'm afraid your timeline continues to be a little out of whack here.

Rick, you wrote that, “Bob Sungenis, fully aware of the theological implications of an official promulgation of such an outrage, did not and could not have stood by silently.” Could not have stood by silently. Hmmmm.

In the Culture Wars article published in January of 2008, Bob said of his 27 July 2007 meeting with Frs. King and Massa at the Diocese of Harrisburg that, “I knew upon leaving the building the erroneous theology [Fr. King], Rhoades and the USCCB were attempting to propagate to unsuspecting Catholics.” And more recently (October 2010) he wrote in the comments section of Discover Magazine that, “During the meeting with Fr. King, I discovered that both he and Bishop Rhoades held to the heresy of antisupersessionism – the view that the Jews still retained legal possession of the Mosaic covenant” (http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/09/14/geocentrism-seriously/#comment-318558).

These are very serious charges, indeed. And as you point out, Bob just isn't the kind of man who could ever allow such damnable evil to continue unabated without immediately exposing the perpetrators for the frauds and subversives that they truly are.

If that is the truth, if Bob knew right then and there that Fr. King and Bishop Rhoades held to what he considered to be an extremely dangerous heresy and were attempting to propagate it to “unsuspecting Catholics”, then why did he assure his readers that Bishop Rhoades’ teaching on Jewish issues was trustworthy a mere four days after this same meeting? Why did Bob gush about His Excellency’s gifts of “wisdom and counsel”, going so far as to say that he considered his “direction as if it was from God Himself” and pledging your filial obedience because "he acts in God's stead"? Again, Bob wrote these things a mere four days after the meeting in question. Here are his own words, written on July 31, 2007:

R. Sungenis: "Neither our obedience to our bishop nor our bishop's directives [about my handling of Jewish issues] should in any way be interpreted as either of us compromising on the truth, but only that the truth be communicated with....a 'human and Christian spirit'...both in its content and in its tone…"

R. Sungenis: "I take their wisdom and counsel with the utmost seriousness and consider their direction as if it was from God himself. I consider it an honor not only to be a member of the Catholic Church but also to be under the vigilance of such wise and caring pastors. In short, I consider it a privilege to obey them."

R. Sungenis: "If in the future we write any new material on the Jews, it will always be with the required due diligence, as if the bishop were present with us. Since he acts in God’s stead, we will do our utmost to please him so as to preserve the peace and tranquility he so desires to maintain in the body of Christ." (http://web.archive.org/web/20070928035818/http://www.catholicintl.com/articles/CAI_and_the_Jews.pdf)

Two very different stories. Two very different responses from Bob “He Who Cannot Be Silent” Sungenis. In light of the fact that Bob wrote the negative story only after he became angry with Bishop Rhoades, I think one can make a solid guess as to which story is false.

Again, at Fr. Zulhsdorf’s blog, you wrote, “It’s clear some folks didn’t like the fact that he demolished this ‘teaching’ [the sentence on page 131 of the USCCA] so completely, so devastatingly, in his memorable essay in ‘Culture Wars’...”

You know, Rick, I can’t recall anyone who said “boo” to Bob merely for criticizing this sentence and saying that it needed to be changed. And I can’t remember anyone who specifically criticized Bob simply for rejecting the dual covenant error and showing why it was wrong. Can you provide some names and citations showing all these people who were so upset about this, specifically? Can you show us even one person who attacked him specifically for simply rejecting/criticizing the idea that Jews have their own salvation plan or specifically for simply objecting to the one sentence on page 131 of the USCCA? I’ve never seen one and I've read a lot about this controversy. Please present the actual quotes, links, articles. Some direct evidence, please.

Now, on the other hand, I certainly do remember Bob being criticized for broad-brushing the entire conference of Catholic bishops as being willing agents of evil in relation to this issue. I also remember him being criticized for floating an erroneous conspiracy theory about the vote to change the one sentence on page 131 of the USCCA.

In fact, Bob was criticized for just these things at the RSATJ blog, remember? Here it is, in case you just forgot:

And while we’re at it, Rick, would you please show where Bob Sungenis or Tom Herron stated that Bishop Rhoades or Fr. King singled out Bob’s criticism of the one problematic sentence on page 131 of the USCCA and that they were unhappy about it? Tom Herron was at Bob’s meeting with the Diocese of Harrisburg and wrote a lengthy account in Culture Wars called “Fear of the Jews in Harrisburg” (Oct. 2007). There’s no mention of it there. Neither did Bob mention anything about Bishop Rhoades supposedly being upset with his criticism of the USCCA in his article “Catholic Apologetics International and Its Teachings on the Jews” (CAITJ), written a mere 4 days after Bob’s meeting at the diocese, or in his Culture Wars article “Old Covenant: Revoked or Not Revoked?” (OCRNR). So if this was The Issue, why didn't anybody--including Bob himself--actually say so at the time?

Again, at Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s blog, you singled out Bob’s public criticisms of this one sentence in the USCCA as the reason he was “rewarded” by Bishop Rhoades by being told to stop calling his organization “Catholic.” I’m going to have to press you for proof of that claim, Rick. So pony up.

Ironically, if you want to know what actually precipitated the 23 Aug 2007 letter from the Diocese of Harrisburg telling Bob to stop writing about all Jewish issues or he would need to remove the word “Catholic” from his work, all you had to do is read Bob’s account in “Old Covenant: Revoked or Not Revoked?” Bob spells it out plainly there. What actually precipitated the 23 Aug 2007 letter from the Diocese of Harrisburg was the posting of Bob’s article, “Catholic Apologetics International and Its Teachings on the Jews” (CAITJ). Here it is, in Bob’s own words:

(R. Sungenis): “when I subsequently wrote a new article whose “tone” was proper but insisted that: (a) the Jews are responsible for their disbelief in Christ, (b) the Jews are no longer the people of God but can become such by believing in Jesus Christ, (c) that there exist no other unfulfilled promises to the Jews except the promise to save them if they turn to Christ, I was then told by the bishop that my opinions showed a lack of “charity and respect for the Jewish people and for Judaism itself.” He then took back his previous offer to allow me to change the “tone” of my articles and forthwith ordered me to stop writing about the Jews and Judaism altogether.” (OCRNR, p. 11)

The article Bob refers to here is CAITJ (July 31, 2007). So, it was CAITJ that precipitated the 23 Aug 2007 response from the diocese.

If you need further proof of this fact, it can found in Fr. Harrison’ article (June 2008). Here is what Fr. Harrison wrote:

(Fr. Harrison): “After the July 27 meeting at the chancery, Dr. Sungenis left on his website a letter to his readers that included a 7-point statement of the “qualified opinion” of Catholic Apologetics International on theological and biblical aspects of the relations between the Catholic Church and Judaism [CAITJ] . . . When Dr. Sungenis communicated to the Diocese the information just mentioned, sending a copy of the aforesaid letter [CAITJ] to his website readers, the Vicar General, Fr. King, replied with a long letter, dated August 23, 2007, stating that in the judgment of Bishop Rhoades, the 7-point statement on Judaism contained in the letter was not fully satisfactory because of the tone and content of some passages. Fr. King’s letter passed on the following message to Dr. Sungenis from Bishop Rhoades:

He asks that you remove the recently posted letter, and that you refrain from publishing on all topics directly or tangentially related to Judaism or the Jewish people. The Bishop issues this directive because some of your views do not adhere to explicit Church teaching and are not imbued with the living voice of the Magisterium, which includes charity and respect for the Jewish people and for Judaism itself. . . . It is Bishop Rhoades’ hope and prayer that you . . . refrain from further commenting on matters related to Judaism or the Jewish people.

Later in the same article, Fr. Harrison mentioned that Fr. King also reiterated Bishop Rhoades’ June 29th admonition about ordering Bob to remove the name “Catholic” if he didn’t comply (pp 14-15).

So, now that we’ve established that CAITJ was what precipitated the 23 Aug 2007 letter from Fr. King to Bob telling him to stop writing about all Jewish issues or he would be ordered to remove the name “Catholic”, one question remains: to what exactly in CAITJ did the Diocese of Harrisburg actually object?

Unfortunately, we can’t know everything with absolute certainty at this juncture because Bob has refused to release that letter. In fact, even Tom Herron – who Bob asked to help him at his meeting with the diocese – wasn’t allowed to read either the June 27 letter from Bishop Rhoades or the August 23 correspondence from Fr. King (which Herron mentioned in “Fear of the Jews in Harrisburg”).

Why is Bob being so secretive with these two letters, Rick? In the introduction to Fr. Harrison’s article, Bob admitted that he never agreed to keep this correspondence with Bishop Rhoades and Fr. King private. And he’s already leaked whatever few selective snippets he thinks support his story. I’m assuming that you can’t possibly believe he’s refraining out of concern for the welfare and reputation of Bishop Rhoades and Fr. King, can you? Fr. Harrison stated that these letters were “long.” I’m sure those long letters would make many things much more clear for everyone. So why don’t you ask your friend Bob to finally stop playing unseemly games and release both of these letters in their entirety?

Now, according to your story, Rick, the diocese objected to Bob’s criticism of page 131 of the USCCA. That’s the real reason they told him to stop writing about Jews and forced him to remove the name “Catholic.” The most obvious problem for your story is that CAITJ says absolutely nothing about page 131 of the USCCA. See for yourself: http://web.archive.org/web/20070928035818/http://www.catholicintl.com/articles/CAI_and_the_Jews.pdf

In fact, even the word from page 131 of the USCCA that sent Bob to the moon (or to a Stanley Kubrick movie set) appears exactly one time and it had nothing to do with the Mosaic covenant: “valid”. Even one of Bob’s other crucial words that he insists upon in relation to the covenant issue is missing: “revoked.”

And isn’t it just obvious that Bob would have been shouting it from the rooftops if there were anything in these letters from Bishop Rhoades or Fr. King criticizing him for his opposition to the one problematic sentence on page 131 of the USCCA? Of course he would have, Rick.

So again, why not ask your friend Bob Sungenis to make both letters public, in full? If he has nothing to hide, then this shouldn’t be a problem for him at all.

Just FYI, I will address CAITJ in a future post. There was plenty that the Diocese of Harrisburg could legitimately have objected to.

For almost five years, Bob spews material across the Internet attacking Jews - none of it having anything to do with page 131 of the USCCA. He ramps up his anti-Semitic screed to the point of posting well over 100 additional attacks on Jews in a span of about a year and a half. He gets caught red-handed using white supremacists, Nazis, Holocaust deniers. He gets featured by a U.S. hate monitor as "one of the most rabid and open anti-Semites". Multiple people contact the bishop to complain. Now, this is important, Rick. What were people contacting the bishop about? His criticism of the sentence on page 131 of the USCCA? His criticism of the idea that Jews have their own salvation plan with God? No, Rick. Bishop Rhoades was contacted specifically because of all the kinds of idiotic anti-Semitic crap listed here: http://www.sungenisandthejews.com/Section2.html and here: http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2007/06/if-its-against-jews-thats-still-good_14.html and here http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2007/06/sungenis-inventing-jews-robin-williams.html and here: http://sungenisandthejews.blogspot.com/2007/05/more-notable-quotes-from-sungenis.html.

Even the SPLC (which I cite here, but do not intend to give a blanket endorsement of) said this: “The Report later sent a letter to Sungenis’ bishop in Harrisburg, Pa., detailing Sungenis’ anti-Semitic activities. Many other concerned Catholics and organizations have done likewise” (http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2007/08/17/anti-semitic-leader-rebuked-by-catholic-bishop). And what kinds of things did this organization explicitly cite regarding Bob as being objectionable? “Conspiracy mongering”, articles by “Ted Pike” and “Michael Collins Piper who has worked for years for Willis Carto, a leading anti-Semite and Holocaust denier” (http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-report/browse-all-issues/2006/winter/the-dirty-dozen). Even from this organization there was not one word about the sentence on pg. 131 of the USCCA.

Very shortly after this deluge of protests concerning Bob’s conspiracy-mongering, the bishop ordered him to cease writing and posting about Jews. Bob ignored the order and instead slandered the bishop and adds yet more inflammatory material, until he gets called in to meet with Fr. King and Fr. Massa. He finally budges and agrees to cut most of the crap. But then he writes another article--at times presumptuous, at times pompous--that basically places almost all Jews from the time of Christ until the end of the world in Hell, endows his private opinions with almost magisterial authority, and warns Catholics about "placating" Da Jooz. To make matters worse, he gives the false impression that Bishop Rhoades read and signed off on this article!

So Bishop Rhoades decides after all this, quite rightly, that Bob simply cannot be trusted to handle Jewish issues responsibly and tells him to cease and desist or take the name Catholic off the organization. It’s just that simple.

But according to you (Rick), what really made Bishop Rhoades take action against Bob was that he disputed a sentence on page 131 of the USCCA regarding the Mosaic Covenant. This is your story, even though neither the diocese, nor Tom Herron, nor Bob himself ever said so at the time. This is your story even though the first really prominent treatment of page 131 of the USCCA on Bob’s site was the letter written to Cardinal Levada on 5 September 2007, after Bob had been told by Bishop Rhoades to remove the name Catholic.

This kind of disconnect from reality and lack of common sense is reminiscent of a very funny scene in "The Jerk", where Navin Johnson (the Jerk, played by Steve Martin) is being shot at by a sniper. As a few cans nearby are struck by bullets, Navin concludes that the sniper is really targeting "these cans!" and not him. So he does everything he can to get away from the cans that the sniper supposedly hates. Here's a clip of the hilarious scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tcwz8-EfFYE

To be quite honest, Rick, this looks like yet another tin foil hat conspiracy, crafted purposely to ignore the elephantine body of evidence documenting Bob’s misbehavior and fixating on one particular bit of minutia in order to make out Bob to be a big hero. But I guess that it’s got all the makings of a great one--muddled dates, muddled "facts"and a lack of evidence all glued together with lots of suspicion and rash speculation. Nicely done.

My scenario was not implausible at all. Just yesterday I showed how Bob said that Mark Shea was on the "darker side" and how he tends to put people in good and bad categories. He questioned my own Catholic faith not too long ago (but later retracted it). So it is quite possible. For Bob, it's a very black and white world.

When I speak of the problematic sentence on pg. 131 of the USCCA as "minutia", I do not mean that the change itself was unimportant but that Rick is ignoring the elephant of Bob's behavior standing right next to him while straining to manufacture some minute connection between Bob's criticism of this sentence and the order to remove the word "Catholic" from his apostolate.

As we said years ago, the change itself was important and welcome and the bishops--including Bishop Rhoades--voted overwhelmingly to do so. And I know for a fact that many good Catholics worked with the bishops to effect that change, without opting to make a public spectacle of themselves or positioning themselves as judges, juries, and enemies of the U.S. Catholic bishops.

What exactly do the pro-Jewish Catholics here understand by a Synagogue of Satan?

I mean, saying most Jews between rejection of Jesus and the Conversion of the Jews land in Hell is no more shacking than saying the same about most Protestants between 1517 and present (excluding converts and near converts) or that most Freemasons between 1717 and present (excluding converts like Haydn and John Salza) go to Hell. Or most Moslems between Hegirah and present, and so on, and so forth.

83. . . . Regarding the “so-called Jews” mentioned in two parallel passages (2:9 and 3:9), the author rejects their pretensions and calls them a “synagogue of Satan”. In 2:9, these “so-called Jews” are accused of defaming the Christian community of Smyrna. In 3:9, Christ announces that they will be compelled to pay homage to the Christians of Philadelphia. These passages suggest that Christians are denying the title of Jew to the Israelites who defame them, and range themselves on the side of Satan, “the accuser of our brothers” (Rv 12:10). There is a then positive appreciation of “Jew” as a title of honour, an honour that is denied to a synagogue which is actively hostile to Christians.

. . . .

B. Pastoral Orientations

. . . .

In the New Testament, the reproaches addressed to Jews are not as frequent or as virulent as the accusations against Jews in the Law and the Prophets. Therefore, they no longer serve as a basis for anti-Jewish sentiment. To use them for this purpose is contrary to the whole tenor of the New Testament. Real anti-Jewish feeling, that is, an attitude of contempt, hostility and persecution of the Jews as Jews, is not found in any New Testament text and is incompatible with its teaching. What is found are reproaches addressed to certain categories of Jews for religious reasons, as well as polemical texts to defend the Christian apostolate against Jews who oppose it.

But it must be admitted that many of these passages are capable of providing a pretext for anti-Jewish sentiment and have in fact been used in this way. To avoid mistakes of this kind, it must be kept in mind that the New Testament polemical texts, even those expressed in general terms, have to do with concrete historical contexts and are never meant to be applied to Jews of all times and places merely because they are Jews. The tendency to speak in general terms, to accentuate the adversaries' negative side, and to pass over the positive in silence, failure to consider their motivations and their ultimate good faith, these are characteristics of all polemical language throughout antiquity, and are no less evident in Judaism and primitive Christianity against all kinds of dissidents.

The fact that the New Testament is essentially a proclamation of the fulfilment of God's plan in Jesus Christ, puts it in serious disagreement with the vast majority of the Jewish people who do not accept this fulfilment. The New Testament then expresses at one and the same time its attachment to Old Testament revelation and its disagreement with the Synagogue. This discord is not to be taken as “anti-Jewish sentiment”, for it is disagreement at the level of faith, the source of religious controversy between two human groups that take their point of departure from the same Old Testament faith basis, but are in disagreement on how to conceive the final development of that faith. Although profound, such disagreement in no way implies reciprocal hostility. The example of Paul in Rm 9-11 shows that, on the contrary, an attitude of respect, esteem and love for the Jewish people is the only truly Christian attitude in a situation which is mysteriously part of the beneficent and positive plan of God. Dialogue is possible, since Jews and Christians share a rich common patrimony that unites them. It is greatly to be desired that prejudice and misunderstanding be gradually eliminated on both sides, in favour of a better understanding of the patrimony they share and to strengthen the links that bind them.

What is truly remarkable about Dave Palm's latest post, and this is a theme I will develop in my fuller response, is that he apparently sees no irony at all in his "judge and jury" analogy.

It apparently has not yet sunk in, for Mr. Palm, that Dr. Sungenis was denied an imprimatur by----Bishop Rhoades----who denied it *precisely by reference to the heretical quote Mr. Palm insists was never believed by the Bishop in the first place*!

As I examine the sequence of events in this ugly case, and especially the horrific after-the-fact special pleading of the Get Sungenis folks......

While you're crafting your response, do please keep focused specifically on your claim that Bob's opposition to the one sentence on pg. 131 of the USCCA is the reason he was "rewarded" with the command to remove "Catholic" from his apostolate. You also raised the issue of the denial of the imprimatur to the CASB volume on Revelation. We wrote about that years ago, pointing out a few of the kinds of reasons that imprimatur was likely denied:

1) It’s important to point out that at no time did the denial of the imprimatur single out the one problematic sentence on page 131 of the USCCA. There are two entire pages referred to in the actual denial: pp 130-131. And thank you for bringing to light some new evidence that I don’t believe Bob ever mentioned before (at your blog). Not only did the denial mention pages 130-131 of the USCCA, it mentioned several other things in the denial like Lumen Gentium 16, Nostra Aetate 4, CCC 839-40 and 597-598, and the Documents of the Commission of the Holy See for Religious Relations with the Jews.

We never knew that Bob was denied also because of his treatment of “Outside the Church there is no salvation” as contained in Lumen Gentium 14-16 and the CCC 846-848. So thank you.

Again, it’s hard sometimes because Bob typically only leaks what he thinks will help him rather than being forthright and releasing everything so people can see for themselves. In fact, Bob was caught being very deceptive and dishonest about the whole imprimatur affair. Did you know that, Rick? Probably not, because it was before he drew you into his “inner circle.” See here:

2) Did Bob tell you that he submitted this CASB to another bishop? Assuming he was telling the truth, he was obviously denied by that bishop As well.

3) Were you aware that Dr. Art Sippo said, before the denial, that he didn't think it could get an imprimatur? As we wrote in May of 2008:

"It is interesting to note that, totally independent of our analysis and before the actual denial of the imprimatur on CASB2 broke into the public, Dr. Art Sippo commented on the Envoy discussion forum that from what he had read in CASB2, he didn't think it would receive an imprimatur. He proved to be prescient on the matter."

4) If you know anything about imprimaturs, you know that bishops themselves aren’t the ones reviewing the books. You don’t even know whether Bishop Rhoades himself ever even read it. In fact, the letter he received was from Carol Houghton, not Bishop Rhoades personally.

5) There’s been no evidence presented that the imprimatur issue has any connection to the cease and desist issue, which did come directly from Bishop Rhoades himself in June 2007. Conversely, there are mountains of evidence that the kind of anti-Semitic crap he was spewing at the time was directly responsible for the bishop’s intervention. The bishop was being inundated with complaints about what, Rick? Bob’s criticism of page 131 of the USCCA? No - it was all about his anti-Semitic crap!

If you think otherwise, then provide the proof by posting Bishop Rhoades’ letter of 29 June 2007 in its entirety for everyone to see. Then post Fr. King’s letter of August 23 for everyone to see.

I do ask also that you keep in mind that there is a huge difference, a difference in principle, between on the one hand stating that a prelate did not respond to a particular situation in exactly the way that you want and on the other hand accusing him on the basis of that response of holding a heresy. Even if Bishop Rhoades's response to the sentence of pg. 131 of the USCCA is in someone's personal opinion inadequate, it remains that his response was orthodox! How one can conclude from this that he actually holds the dual covenant heresy, let alone that his whole reason for dealing with Bob was over Bob's opposition to this sentence on p. 131?

Remember, there’s more than ample direct evidence that Bishop Rhoades DOES NOT hold to the dual covenant theory:

It's serious business to accuse a successor of the Apostles of heresy. And it is a matter of justice and charity to defend anyone, but especially a bishop, against such erroneous and slanderous charges.

Again, I focus on one extremely helpful insight into the method employed on the Get Sungenis blog, which is really proving to be a fascinating read:

DP: "If you know anything about imprimaturs, you know that bishops themselves aren’t the ones reviewing the books. You don’t even know whether Bishop Rhoades himself ever even read it. In fact, the letter he received was from Carol Houghton, not Bishop Rhoades personally."

>> This is a quite remarkable statement. Clearly Dave has the letter. Clearly he has read the letter. And yet he proposes that we "don;t even know whether Bishop Rhoades himself ever even read it."

But what we do know is that it is Bishop Rhoades himself who denied the imprimatur.

Again, I focus on one extremely helpful insight into the method employed on the Get Sungenis blog, which is really proving to be a fascinating read:

DP: "If you know anything about imprimaturs, you know that bishops themselves aren’t the ones reviewing the books. You don’t even know whether Bishop Rhoades himself ever even read it. In fact, the letter he received was from Carol Houghton, not Bishop Rhoades personally."

>> This is a quite remarkable statement. Clearly Dave has the letter. Clearly he has read the letter. And yet he proposes that we "don;t even know whether Bishop Rhoades himself ever even read it."

But what we do know is that it is Bishop Rhoades himself who denied the imprimatur.

These passages suggest that Christians are denying the title of Jew to the Israelites who defame them, and range themselves on the side of Satan, “the accuser of our brothers” (Rv 12:10). There is a then positive appreciation of “Jew” as a title of honour, an honour that is denied to a synagogue which is actively hostile to Christians.

I totally agree.

As for Heavenly terminology, we Christians are the Jews, whether Hebrew or Goy in ancestry.

As for earthly terminology, after the Rabbinic council of Jamnia, the Gospel of the same Apostle, uses Jews, in narrator's person, for enemies of the Christ, because the council of Jamnia had already usurped the term thus.

I wrote, "If you know anything about imprimaturs, you know that bishops themselves aren’t the ones reviewing the books. You don’t even know whether Bishop Rhoades himself ever even read it. In fact, the letter he received was from Carol Houghton, not Bishop Rhoades personally."

To which, Rick replied: "This is a quite remarkable statement. Clearly Dave has the letter. Clearly he has read the letter."

Your conspiratorial mindset is showing again, Rick. I don't have the letter and I haven't read it, but I can and did read the public record. In "Fear of the Jews in Harrisburg", Tom Herron stated that the denial was written by Carol Houghton and not Bishop Rhoades (Culture Wars, Oct. 2007, p. 12). And in Bob's article, "Jacob Michael, the Imprimatur and the Smear Campaign" (1 July 2007), he included a facsimile of the top and bottom of the letter from Dr. Houghton, leaving out all the very important and enlightening facts that you've now graciously provided, of course.

Yet another conspiracy theory solved.

And did you not notice that I thanked you for divulging so much more about the reasons the Diocese of Harrisburg cited for the rejection of CASB 2 that I didn't know about previously? You brought it all out right at your Magisterial Fundies blog here: http://www.magisterialfundies.blogspot.com/2012/01/concerning-harrisburg-affair-pt-2.html If I had the letter, that wouldn't have been new information to me, right? Bob never forthrightly came forth with all the citations you provided from Dr. Houghton as to why CASB was rejected for an imprimatur. Instead, all he mentioned was page 131 of the USCCA. So again, thank you for your help. All Bob has done to date is to leak those selective snippets of the imprimatur rejection that he thinks will help him - almost exactly in the same way that he's released selective snippets of the correspondence from Bishop Rhoades (27 June 2007) and Fr. King (23 Aug 2007). Do you see a suspicious pattern there? Are your conspiratorial antennae picking that one up, Rick?

You write, "what we do know is that it is Bishop Rhoades himself who denied the imprimatur."

Yep. Typically, a bishop has some trusted individuals who look over imprimatur submissions. And the bishop typically signs off on their recommendations. So, the authority technically comes from the bishop. But it doesn't mean that the bishop personally read the book or that he even went over the feedback with a fine-toothed comb. Based on what you've leaked, it seems obvious that he would have looked at all the negative feedback he received and said, "Oh, dear." Again, remember that Dr. Art Sippo predicted that CASB2 wouldn't receive an imprimatur before it came out that it had be denied. If you look at his blog, you'll see that he's recommending CASB6 now, so you can't just write off his prediction about CASB2 to him just being one of those darned rotters against poor Bob or what have you.

Now, most importantly, we do have one letter written personally by the bishop himself, right Rick? And that was a cease and desist letter dated 27 June 2007. So, if you want to know exactly what the bishop was objecting to when he told Bob to cease and desist from writing and posting about all Jewish issues, all you have to do is read that letter. So, again, why don't you ask your friend Bob Sungenis to release the letter in its entirety for everyone to see rather than playing this weird and unseemly game?

The bishop's letter was from from 29 June 2007, not 27 June. Finger slip.....I still want to see what it says about that single sentence on pg. 131 of the USCCA. Let's have the whole letter, Rick, along with the 23 August letter from Fr. King. The whole thing.

Rick, you write, "Unlike Bob, I do not have eleven children to feed, and unlike Bob, I have friends who are canon lawyers and have followed this case closely for years."

This sob story has been repeated several times by Sungenis fans and it's getting more than a little tired. Bob has publicly stated on more than one occasion that since he's been criticized for his Jewish writings and postings, his income has only gone up dramatically.

Most recently, in his new "book" (and I use that term very loosely), "The Catholic/Jewish Dialogue: Controversies and Corrections", Bob writes:

R. Sungenis: "In reality, their campaign against me has resulted in an amazing phenomenon – the donations to our apostolate have actually doubled in the last few years." (p. 635)

Was he lying, Rick?

So, if you really want to put on your conspiracy theorist's cap, maybe we're actually secretly working for Bob and this is all a ruse just to push up donations?

Hmmmm.

Now, even if his donations were going down (which they're not at all, according to Bob himself), you seem to be forgetting that it's easily within Bob's control to remedy that.

What we've written has been provoked by Bob's repeated erroneous, unjust, inflammatory attacks. We're defending people from him, which is an act of both justice and charity.

If Bob would just stop with the conspiracy mongering, and erroneous and slanderous charges of heresy against innocent individuals (including a successor of the Apostles), offer a proper apology and retraction, and then return to core Catholic apologetics then we wouldn't even be having this conversation. It's that simple.

Dear Mr., Mrs. or Ms. S, whatever the case may be, I'm not surprised that you are confused -- especially when you leave a word out of your two sentence comment. Give it a rest, read my comment again, and with some extra effort you may be able to figure it out. Really, it's not that hard! :-)

James Phillips

P.S. You may want to scour the Internet again with my name to see if you can pick up some more supposed "conspiratorial" anti-Semite dirt on me. If you can't find anymore I'm sure you can make some up.

Sounds like I hit a nerve. Why not let your audience be the judge of what is garbage and what isn't or would that be too much for the tender sensitivities of some of same? It's a good thing that you are not allowed to delete portions of the Bible from the Bible! What I posted was extremely tame compared to the words of our Saviour in the N.T.

For the record, I saved a copy of my comment off of your website to show what you censor.

Lighten up (or perhaps I should say toughen up) Dave. "It's only a simple blog site." Just keep singing that to the tune of that hit by your Rolling Stones' "It's only rock n' roll ...." :-)

I'll give you the choice, James, that I give all folks who want to make idiotic (or in this case also bigoted) comments on my site: cease now or I will seriously consider deleting all your comments, no matter what they say.

Your choice: people can read your existing drivel, or they can read nothing by you at all here.

Sure, you can keep all your rotgut on your site, that 4 (maybe 5) people read. Like I said, your choice.

The level of ignorance, paranoia and hate is very strange. It would be interesting to commission a sociological study on little groups like this, how similarly disposed minds manage to find each other and congregate. There's an odd, almost cult-like quality to it.

James writes, "You may want to scour the Internet again with my name to see if you can pick up some more supposed "conspiratorial" anti-Semite dirt on me. If you can't find anymore I'm sure you can make some up."

Thank you for your concern, James. But it took no effort or time at all to find and present a small sampling of your many interesting and enlightening views and connections on Google. You've presented some additional very interesting and enlightening material right here in this comments box, too. There's really no need to make anything up.

At your blog-reply to Palm, you wrote, "I stopped at the beginning, where Palm situated his attack upon me by having recourse to the observation that I-scandalously!- hold to the ancient and apostolic Catholic Faith in this exact respect: I am a geocentrist."

I think that's an oddly exaggerated reaction. The article started off by explaining to readers who you are and your connections to Sungenis. I don't see anything false or excessive there. It's very mild compared to some of the things you and James Phillips have written (including what you wrote later in the same blog-reply).

In regard to your connection with Sungenis through geocentrism, all Palm wrote was, "Rick is also a geocentrist (he believes that the universe revolves around a stationary earth) and was one of the main speakers at Bob's first Galileo Was Wrong conference."

That's what offended you so deeply that you refused to read any further? It's a statement of fact. Not to be unkind, but you might want to consider whether your defensive reaction says more about you than it does about Palm.

Your reaction to his introductory paragraph seems all the more odd to me considering your subsequent description of Palm and the other Sungenis critics:

"odious, spooky, shadowy bunch of reputation-destroying fanatics."

"cabal of self-appointed ecclesiastical KGB operatives"

"apologists for the enemies of our Holy Faith, and enemies of its bravest defenders."

Maybe I missed it, but I didn't see anything in his article approaching that level of ad-hominem vitriol.

You said that you didn't read any more of what Palm wrote after reading his first paragraph because you found it so offensive. One supposes this is designed to provide another excuse for why you had nothing to say about the actual substance of what he wrote. But it's hard to believe that you didn't read all of what he wrote based on your comments right here in this combox. What Palm posted here is the same thing that he posted at his blog.

Palm: "The comments below are also substantially the same as those I made in the comments box at Dave Armstrong's blog"

"What is truly remarkable about Dave Palm's latest post, and this is a theme I will develop in my fuller response, is that he apparently sees no irony at all in his 'judge and jury' analogy." (Rick DeLano)

Considering people like you and the kinds of extremists with whom you associate, is it really so hard to understand the value of anonymity? On two occasions (not related to this issue), I had people search my information out and make threatening calls late at night to my home. I decided that was enough.

As I mentioned earlier, you, Sungenis, Hoffman et al write under your full names and that hasn't helped you to maintain charity. I'm very comfortable with people judging what I've written in comparison.

So why not deal with the substance of what I wrote rather than beating your chest?

I've been a strong and vocal critic of Internet anonymity, too, for 15 years, but private information being invaded and late calls at night are, to me, sufficient reasons.

Sometimes there are legitimate reasons (as in this present case). In many cases, though, there are not, and people want to merely hide behind anonymity, so they won't be accountable to anyone, and in the worst cases, can even take on fake identities.

S, nice try. I'm not as gullible as that or else you are just way, way too paranoid. When, I ask you why you hide behind your anonymity you say, "Considering people like you and the kinds of extremists with whom you associate, is it really so hard to understand the value of anonymity?" Indeed, it is, especially when your statements are nothing, but concocted slanderous falsehoods against peace loving people who might simply strongly disagree with your particular view of things.

People like me, you say?! You really do sound paranoid and you are extremely insulting at the same time. I have never gone around threatening anyone with late night phone calls or otherwise. It's never even occurred to me! I don't look up information on people so I can plot against them or cause them harm. I just don't have that kind of a mindset. I have never been arrested nor had a court order issued against me nor even an order to show cause filed against me for any such ridiculous things as you express or allude to.

People that actually know me (and not people like you who just think or act like they know me by stuff they may have seen on the Internet) think I am a fairly gentle soul even though I have seen some pretty rough things in the Marine Corps in my younger days. I am certainly nothing like the false descriptions you expressly or by insinuation assign to people in your comment.

You say I associate with extremists? Why don't you provide me with the exact names of these extremists? Just who are they and how are you defining an "extremist." (Have you done your job and notified -- at least anonymously -- Homeland Security or the FBI?) You, yourself, are an extremist in your language of false allegations and insinuations against me.

What sorts of proof do you have that me or any of my associates (and again please name names!) goes around making threats, looking up information on people to plot against them, making late night phone calls or otherwise in any sort of a threatening, harassing or intimidating manner? (I ask you this knowing full well that you could can still make further false allegations and still hide behind your veil of anonymity in doing so.) Those are simply not the kinds of people I associate with nor would I ever want to associate with.

And yet you go around saying these kinds of things against me giving any actual or potential nuts out there possible cause to do against me exactly what you fear people might do against you. Go figure. You come across as a total fake. A total phony.

Having said, that I am not judging your interior heart and soul which is of course, between you and your Creator. For all I know, you may have been bullied as a child and you are still negatively impacted by such experiences, that or a million and one other possibilities. I have not walked in your shoes nor you in mine.

James Phillips

P.S. You say I am beating my chest by asking you a few simple questions about why you insist on hiding behind your anonymity. How do you define "beating one's chest?!" I'm afraid your assertion about my beating my chest is a real disconnect, not to mention a diversion.

P.P.S. As for dealing with the substance of what you wrote in your earlier comment. Frankly, I dare not due to Dave's recent threat to delete all my posts if I come across in a way he doesn't like. Hopefully, he will leave this comment in place since I am responding to your false allegations and insinuations against me.

Rick, a lot more evidence could be brought into this discussion which would reenforce the case and repeatedly illustrate the patterns of behavior I've documented. But given the material I laid out here and the nature of your response, I'm content to leave things as they are.

I know this thread is kind of old but I had to say something about my experience with Rick Delano at his blog. I made some comments there because I wanted to give him a chance to convince me that my perception was wrong about Sungenis. I was being respectful and open to hearing the other side. He even thanked me for being fair-minded. But as soon as I started to give proof that his explanations for Sungenis disrespect and disobedience of his bishop didn't work he censored my comments and went off about stuff that had nothing to do with what I was writing really. I felt like I was dealing with my kid brother when he would cover his ears and yell "Lalalalalalal I can't hear you!" LOL

I had already noticed here that neiterh DeLano ,James Phillips or Steve Dalton ever answered how it is that Sungenis promised never again to put up material about Jewish politics or culture again. And I have found out now that he has promised this twice! Look at his web site now. What were those promises all about? You know these guys would go crazy if someone else broke their word over and over like that. But it's out of line to point it out?

Then I saw that Rick Delano had put up a defense of Sungenis by Father Brian Harrison. When I mentioned at his blog that Father Harrison had been answered and that I thought some of the answers were pretty good Delano turned my comment into its own blog posting. I thought that part was kind of funny, actually. Here is it,

So then Delano insists that there really aren't any good answers even though he admits that he hasn't and won't read any of the answers. How can you discuss something like an adult with someone who covers his eyes and ears like that? But he asked me what I think are some of the good answers. So I started to tell him what I thought. And it started out ok and he even thanked me for being fair. And so I pointed out that Sungenis didnt’ take down all the Jewish material when his Bishop told him to (even though Father Harrison incorrectly said that he did) so I didn't perceive how this was doing "everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop" like Mr. Delano said here or "prompt and humble compliance with the original command" as Father Harrison said.

This is when it gets even weirder. I was bothered by another issue more serious than this. And Mr. Delano actually said to me, "Well bring it on".

Does that sound like an invitation to really get into the details to you? It did to me.

So I mentioned how Sungenis had not only NOT taken down the anti-Jewish material but he put up even more things like a cartoon of a Jew pointing a machine gun at a child and making his bishop out to be a heretic and even a book review where Sungenis said things like "There was such unbridled destruction of people and property that, like Jacob saw in his day, we have all the signs that the nation of Israel has made itself "stink" among the nations" and "The Jews are godless and getting more ungodly with each passing day".

Remember that Sungenis was doing all this during the time that his Bishop told him "immediately to desist from commenting on the Jewish people and Judaism both online and in all other publications." I'm sorry, but thats just outright defiance and disrepect. No Catholic should act like that.

But Rick Delano and Father Harrison say that Sungenis did "everything he possibly could to accommodate his bishop" and Father Harrison talks about "prompt and humble compliance with the original command"? I'm sorry, but that's ridiculous from everything I've seen.

So I put up the evidence like DeLano invited me to and all of a sudden he went ballistic and censored my comments. He won't allow that information to go up. The reason he gave is because I was only talking aobut "Jewish issues". LOL Well, hello, isn't it kind of hard not to talk about Jewish issues when that was the problem between Sungenis and his Bishop? Isn't this just a bit ridiculous? Its like Rick Delano saying that he refuses to read Dave Palms material because Palm said that Delano is a geocentrist. But DeLano IS a geocentrist. LOL It just looks like a lame excuse he throws out whenever he doesn't have an answer for something.

It's too bad because for a while I actually thought he was interested in looking into the matter honestly. My mistake. But why tell me to "bring it on" if your just going to censor me for doing what you asked? It's just weird.

He censored you for that? I remember the Sungenis followers getting very angry when Dave Armstrong warned them repeatedly he'd had enough of their excesses - and what they were writing was much worse than what you wrote. Well, God bless you for trying to reason with him.

Dave,

Are you saying that tongue in cheek about Sungenis promoting a David Duke video at his website now? Or are you serious?

I know it's a huge stretch, but it was the only excuse I could imagine. I just saw though that someone named Stephen Dalton commented under the video a couple of weeks ago and warned him about Duke. So, that excuse is out the window.

orthodox:very strange topic for some catholic site. Everyone knows the trurh about september the 11 and the Kubrick Apollo, everyone know the Bible's imperative that we must always tell the truth:

nd when great multitudes stood about him, so that they trod one upon another, he began to say to his disciples: Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. 2 For there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed: nor hidden that shall not be known. 3 For whatsoever things you have spoken in darkness shall be published in the light: and that which you have spoken in the ear in the chambers shall be preached on the housetops.in afganistan were killed mothers and babies recently, your Leon Paneta said - very sorry, but other incidents like this one are possible to happen...Surely, our church fathers - Vasilios Megas (Basil the Great)and the others believe in Genesis, chapter 1, which ingludes geocentrism, young cosmos, the earth including etc.this mrs Sungenis only said things, which are obvious. I don't know well the catholic mind, but it is supposed to be christian - telling thruth, believing in the Scripture. If some jew is killing someone and I react, this is not antisemitism.If someone is gnostic, why mrs Sungenis is gnostic too? Is my english not good enough?Nadia Karagiozowa, WARNA, BULGARIA

I knew Sungenis is a man, I know who he is, I just had mistaken the abbreviation for "mister" in your language. In this discussion I had penetrated at hazard, while searching purposely Sungenis's works.

I knew Sungenis is a man, I know who he is, I just had mistaken the abbreviation for "mister" in your language. In this discussion I had penetrated at hazard, while searching purposely Sungenis's works.

http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/biography/spacemason/mis-title02.jpgInstead of "Freemasons in space", it is better: "Freemasons in Kubrick's studio". A propos did you watch "the passage of Venus"? There was no such passage. The sun, whatever it was, was intact. Venus, whatever it was, did not pass.

And i am very curious to know if someone, Mr Sungenis or other people, has told the truth about the missing Venus, which was expected to pass on the face of the sun on 6th june.It is not strange that Venus did not pass, it was strange and remarkable that all the world exclaimed - look! Venus was pass at it was written in the "scriptures"(astronomic scriptures of corse)We watched "The Emperor’s New Suit "by Hans Christian Andersen.

--- Marcus Grodi (director of The Coming Home Network, and host of the EWTN television show: The Journey Home)

I highly recommend his work, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, which I find to be thoroughly orthodox, well-written, and effective for the purpose of making Catholic truth more understandable and accessible to the public at large.

God bless you in your indefatigable labors on behalf of the Faith! Only God knows how many lives your efforts have touched with the truth. . . . God bless you and give you joy and strength in persevering in your important ministry.

There is someone out there who says what I have to say much better than I ever could -- the smartest Catholic apologist I know of -- Dave Armstrong.

--- Amy Welborn (Catholic author and blogmaster)

I love your books, love your site, love everything you do. God bless you in your work. I'm very grateful for all you've done, and for all you make available. If someone pitches a hard question at me, I go first to your site. Then I send the questioner directly to the page that best answers the question. I know it's going to be on your site.

--- Mike Aquilina (Catholic apologist and author of several books)

People regularly tell me how much they appreciate your work. This new book sounds very useful. Your website is incredible and I recommend it regularly to new Catholics.

--- Al Kresta (Host of Kresta in the Afternoon [EWTN], author of Why Do Catholics Genuflect? and other books)

Dave Armstrong's book A Biblical Defense of Catholicism was one of the first Catholic apologetics books that I read when I was exploring Catholicism. Ever since then, I have continued to appreciate how he articulates the Catholic Faith through his blog and books. I still visit his site when I need a great quote or clarification regarding anything . . . Dave is one of the best cyber-apologists out there.--- Dr. Taylor Marshall (apologist and author of The Crucified Rabbi)

I love how Dave makes so much use of the Scriptures in his arguments, showing that the Bible is fully compatible with Catholicism, even more plausibly so than it is with Protestantism.. . . Dave is the hardest working Catholic apologist I know. He is an inspiration to me.

--- Devin Rose (apologist and author of The Protestant's Dilemma, 28 May 2012 and 30 Aug. 2013)Dave Armstrong['s] website is an amazing treasure trove representing hours–yea a lifetime of material gathered to defend Catholic doctrine. Over the years Dave has gathered the evidence for Catholic teaching from just about every source imaginable. He has the strength not only to understand the Catholic faith, but to understand the subtleties and arguments of his Protestant opponents.--- Fr. Dwight Longenecker (author and prominent blogmaster, 6-29-12)

You are a very friendly adversary who really does try to do all things with gentleness and respect. For this I praise God.--- Nathan Rinne (Lutheran apologist [LC-MS] )

You are one of the most thoughtful and careful apologists out there.

Dave, I disagree with you a lot, but you're honorable and gentlemanly, and you really care about truth. Also, I often learn from you, even with regard to my own field. [1-7-14]

--- Dr. Edwin W. Tait (Anglican Church historian)

Dave Armstrong writes me really nice letters when I ask questions. . . . Really, his notes to me are always first class and very respectful and helpful. . . . Dave Armstrong has continued to answer my questions in respectful and helpful ways. I thank the Lord for him.

--- The late Michael Spencer (evangelical Protestant), aka "The Internet Monk", on the Boar's Head Tavern site, 27 and 29 September 2007

Dave Armstrong is a former Protestant Catholic who is in fact blessedly free of the kind of "any enemy of Protestantism is a friend of mine" coalition-building . . . he's pro-Catholic (naturally) without being anti-Protestant (or anti-Orthodox, for that matter).

---"CPA": Lutheran professor of history [seehis site]: unsolicited remarks of 12 July 2005

I am reading your stuff since I think it is the most thorough and perhaps the best defense of Catholicism out there . . . Dave has been nothing but respectful and kind to me. He has shown me great respect despite knowing full well that I disagree with him on the essential issues.

Dave has been a full-time apologist for years. He’s done much good for thousands of people.

You have a lot of good things to say, and you're industrious. Your content often is great. You've done yeoman work over the decades, and many more people [should] profit from your writing. They need what you have to say.--- Karl Keating (founder and director of Catholic Answers, the largest Catholic apologetics organization in the world; 5 Sep. 2013 and 1 Jan. 2015)

Whether one agrees with Dave's take on everything or not, everyone should take it quite seriously, because he presents his arguments formidably.

I like the way you present your stuff Dave ... 99% of the time.--- Protestant Dave Scott, 4-22-14 on my personal Facebook page.

Who is this Dave Armstrong? What is he really like? Well, he is affable, gentle, sweet, easily pleased, very appreciative, and affectionate . . . I was totally unprepared for the real guy. He's a teddy bear, cuddly and sweet. Doesn't interrupt, sits quietly and respectfully as his wife and/or another woman speaks at length. Doesn't dominate the conversation. Just pleasantly, cheerfully enjoys whatever is going on about him at the moment and lovingly affirms those in his presence. Most of the time he has a relaxed, sweet smile.

--- Becky Mayhew (Catholic), 9 May 2009, on the Coming Home Network Forum, after meeting me in person.

Every so often, I recommend great apostolates, websites, etc. And I am very careful to recommend only the very best that are entirely Catholic and in union with the Church. Dave Armstrong’s Biblical Evidence for Catholicism site is one of those. It is a veritable treasure chest of information. Dave is thorough in his research, relentlessly orthodox, and very easy to read.

Discussions with you are always a pleasure, agreeing or disagreeing; that is a rarity these days.

--- David Hemlock (Eastern Orthodox Christian), 4 November 2014.

What I've appreciated, Dave, is that you can both dish out and take argumentative points without taking things personally. Very few people can do that on the Internet. I appreciate hard-hitting debate that isn't taken personally.

--- Dr. Lydia McGrew (Anglican), 12 November 2014.

Dave Armstrong is a friend of mine with whom I've had many discussions. He is a prolific Catholic writer and apologist. If you want to know what the Catholic Church really believes, Dave is a good choice. Dave and I have our disagreements, but I'll put my arm around him and consider him a brother. There is too much dishonesty among all sides in stating what the "other side" believes. I'll respect someone who states fairly what the other believes.

Recommended Catholic Apologetics Links and Icons

Protestantism: Critical Reflections of an Ecumenical Catholic

Orthodoxy & Citation Permission

To the best of my knowledge, all of my theological writing is "orthodox" and not contrary to the official dogmatic and magisterial teaching of the Catholic Church. In the event of any (unintentional) doctrinal or moral error on my part having been undeniably demonstrated to be contrary to the Sacred Tradition of the Catholic Church, I will gladly and wholeheartedly submit to the authority and wisdom of the Church (Matthew 28:18-20; 1 Timothy 3:15).

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